REBEL secure RAEng funding to work on Emergency Sheltering

Dr Francesco Pomponi has secured prestigious funding from the Royal Academy of Engineering to carry out an ambitious plan of work on the circular design of emergency sheltering for Africa. This funding is part of the Academy’s Global Challenges Research Fund under the scheme ‘Frontiers of Engineering for Development’.

The funding will enable to welcome Lara Alshawawreh to REBEL given her expertise on the topic. The team include a significant number of African partners who will ensure strong relevance and impact of the research, and who will contribute with their fundamental knowledge.

Worth of note is the gender (im)balance of team; for once it is in favour of female researchers and academics as a small step towards real equality, diversity, and inclusivity – all fundamental elements for any form of development, not just the sustainable one.

Francesco is also Co-PI on another grant within the same programme (The Circular Economy in Motion) aimed at creating networks and hubs of expertise who can help promote a quicker transition to a more circular economy.

REBEL sponsor UKGBC event on “Advancing Net Zero: next steps in holistic carbon reductions”

The UKGBC will be running an event on April 19th at the Saint Gobain Innovation Centre in London to advance the Net Zero debate and identify the next steps in holistic carbon reductions.

In participating to this highly interdisciplinary and cross-sectoral event you will:

• Understand how the Paris Agreement affects carbon ambitions in both projects and organisation
• Learn about the latest industry developments and guidance to help you understand carbon assessment and decision making
• Learn best practice from industry leaders on whole life carbon management at project and organisational level
• Debate, discuss and decide how the industry progresses on carbon reduction.

REBEL is one of the sponsors of the event, together with the CIEMAP from the University of Leeds and Land Securities.

Dr Francesco Pomponi from REBEL is one of the speakers in the morning session and will present to the audience the latest update from his EPSRC project as well as current work of the Annex 72 of the International Energy Agency for which he is one of only two UK representatives.

[*UPDATE* The event has sold out in just 24 hours (!!) but you can join a waiting list should places become available in the near future]

Book is out! Embodied Carbon in Buildings published by Springer

It might not be your pick for a sunset reading, or the book you feel you must’ve on a beach island sipping your drink but…the world’s first book (does it sound too much? I swear it’s true) on Embodied Carbon in Buildings is now out and up for grab!

It’s been published by Springer, and it features 22 chapters authored by more than 50 experts worldwide. If you want a truly international snapshot of what’s going on in the field at a global scale there’s no better place to start [if that’s not a good enough reason, it also has a lovely colourful cover!].

The book inception goes back to Francesco’s idea and goodwill at the University of Cambridge and it materialised through the hard work he has done with his co-editors, Dr Catherine De Wolf at EPFL and Dr Alice Moncaster at the Open University.

Machine learning for sustainable structures: a call for data

We are looking at collecting as many structural designs as possible across the three main structural materials, i.e. steel, reinforced concrete and wood.

This will enable the creation of a large dataset to support the application of machine learning in structural engineering. For further information you can request a more comprehensive explanatory document, download the data management plan, or review the project’s aims and objectives. For any clarification, you are welcome to get in touch with Dr Francesco Pomponi (f.pomponi[at]napier.ac.uk), Principal Investigator for this project.

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Click here to start the submission of your structural design. We are hugely grateful!

[WE’RE COMING]

Hey, we’re setting up as much as we can offline so that you’ll find this webspace populated with interesting stuff and extensive content as soon as it goes fully live. There’s some info about us around the website, feel free to have a look and do reach out to us if curious or interested! Speak soon 😉