Scope
The KE fellowship will enable the sharing, flow and translation of knowledge and expertise between the environmental response to hydrogen emissions programme and its stakeholders, partners and user communities.
You should focus on accelerating and amplifying impact throughout the cycle of the programme, by engaging and working with a range of stakeholders (as well as the researchers funded through the programme), such as:
- policymakers
- industry
- user communities
- business intermediaries.
Impact is defined according to the Research Excellence Framework (REF) definition as an effect on, change or benefit to the economy, society, culture, public policy or services, health, the environment or quality of life, beyond academia.
You should identify the key stakeholders, partners and user communities you will interact with, and who will benefit from your programme of work and what impacts this may generate. This should specifically focus on relationships with the following partners in this programme:
- BEIS
- Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra)
- Department for Transport (DfT)
- relevant UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) activities.
Other partners may include, but are not limited to, hydrogen producers, users (potential and real) and the energy community.
Requirements
Your application must demonstrate the criteria of a KE fellow and specific relevance to the environmental response to hydrogen emissions programme scope and objectives.
You should consider how your project will enhance the impact of the environmental response to hydrogen emissions research programme related to the wider community. Think about how you will connect with the most suitable stakeholders to generate impact in terms of:
- reach (how widely the impact has been felt)
- significance (how much difference was made to the beneficiaries).
Other expected requirements of the KE fellow are:
- strengthening existing partnerships with key stakeholders (including BEIS, Defra, DfT and UKRI). Briefings are anticipated to be both written and verbal
- identification of, and engagement plans for other key stakeholders (some examples of which have been named above)
- developing and strengthening relationships within the programme (and across funded projects), which may lead to synergies and combined outputs
- supporting funded projects within the programme to be agile to key stakeholder requirements, for example, setting up a feedback framework between researchers and policy stakeholders (BEIS, Defra and DfT) to reflect and respond to developing policy for research and users
- consider public engagement is a key part of knowledge exchange to translate research outcomes, enabling a route to increasing the impact of research
- identification of the knowledge needs of business, non-government organisations and policymakers
- developing new market opportunities for the exploitation of research outcomes
- providing briefings and reports suitable for policymakers and business users
- demonstrating suitable plans for feedback to key stakeholders through reports or other appropriate reporting mechanisms (you may wish to propose frequency and delivery route for feedback to stakeholders). It is anticipated that the KE fellow will have at least monthly interaction with assigned contacts within BEIS, Defra and DfT, while allowing flexibility for ad-hoc and out-of-schedule updates (for example, at specific milestone points within the programme). The funders welcome applicants proposing innovative and effective ways of delivering these activities.
Additional responsibilities
There will be a programme wide kick-off meeting in early 2023 for funded projects, as well as biannual cross-programme meetings, which the KE fellow is expected to participate in.
These events will allow projects to present their ongoing results and stimulate discussion, and encourage beneficial collaboration between projects, specifically in relation to scenario definition.
An end of programme synthesis report will be developed with input and engagement from all projects. Due to the interlinked nature of the topics of projects funded, the KE fellow will play a key role in the transfer and sharing of information between projects, synthesised through the report, which will feed directly to BEIS, Defra and DfT to inform policy decisions.
In your application, you are expected to set out and expand how your role you will contribute to and facilitate the knowledge exchange for these activities.
Duration
The role must start on 10 February 2023 and last no longer than 24 months.
Funding available
We will provide up to £250,000 of funding towards the fellowship. KE fellowships are awarded at 100% direct costs. You should tick the ‘exception’ box in Je-S.
The KE fellowship will cover the KE fellow’s salary including:
- superannuation
- national insurance
- specific allowances
- up to £40,000 for travel and other associated work plan costs (this includes costs for attendance at all programme-wide meetings, such as kick-off meetings and meetings that take place twice a year).
The award does not cover overheads and must not exceed the available budget.
Sub-contracts
Sub-contracts are eligible costs on proposals submitted to this opportunity but should only be used for the procurement of goods and services.
Sub-contracts are not permitted for research partners providing intellectual input into the project, where a research partner or project partner relationship is more appropriate.
Hydrogen programme
You should read the environmental response to hydrogen emissions funding opportunity as this fellowship is linked to the delivery of the projects within the programme.
NERC facilities
It is not expected that KE fellow will require NERC facilities. However, if you wish to use a NERC service or facility, you should email the NERC office (hydrogen@nerc.ukri.org) to discuss before submitting an application.
If the NERC office feels your requirement is justified you will need to contact the relevant facility at least two months prior to the closing date of this funding opportunity to discuss the proposed work and receive confirmation that you can provide the services required within the timeframe of the grant.
The facility will then provide a technical assessment form that includes the calculated cost of providing the service.
NERC services and facilities must be costed within the limits of the proposal. See the full list of NERC facilities and resources. You will need to attach the technical assessment form to your Joint electronic systems (Je-S) application.
Most facilities require a technical assessment except for high performance computing, ship-time or marine equipment and the large research facilities at Harwell. These services have their own policies for access and costing.
Data management
The NERC data policy must be adhered to, and a full data management plan will be developed by successful applicants with the appropriate Environmental Data Centre. NERC will pay the data centre directly on behalf of the programme for archival and curation services, but you should ensure you request sufficient resource to cover preparation of data for archiving by the research team.
