ADEPT Live Labs 2 is a three-year UK wide £30million programme funded by the Department for Transport with the aim of decarbonising local roads.
About the programme
The programme has been developed by the Association of Directors of Environment, Economy, Planning and Transport (ADEPT) and follows the hugely successful Live Labs 1.
The programme consists of seven projects which are being led by local authorities working alongside commercial and academic partners, with the ambition of supporting the transition to net zero carbon local roads.
Over the next three years they will be collaborating with Devon County Council and other local highways authority-led partnerships from across the UK to develop and implement zero carbon and climate change focused local roads plans.
The aim is for lessons learnt from these project to be applied to future schemes right across the UK.
Live Labs 2 projects
The seven projects that have been awarded a share of the £30m Live Labs 2 funding are:
- Devon County Council: A382 (Including Jetty Marsh Link Road) – Carbon Negative Project.
- East Riding of Yorkshire Council (in partnership with the Department for Infrastructure Northern Ireland; Cambridgeshire County Council; Derbyshire County Council; Hull City Council; Lancashire County Council; Oxfordshire County Council; Westminster City Council and York City Council): High visual efficiency for low carbon lighting – decarbonising street lighting.
- Liverpool City Council: (in partnership with Aberdeen City Council, Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and Newcastle City Council): Liverpool ‘Ecosystem of Things’ driving a low-carbon economy.
- North Lanarkshire Council: UK centre of excellence for material decarbonisation in local roads.
- South Gloucestershire Council and West Sussex County Council: Greenprint – a net carbon-negative systems model for green infrastructure management.
- Transport for West Midlands: UK Centre of Excellence for Decarbonising Roads – South Campus
- Wessex partnership: (Somerset County Council, Cornwall Council and Hampshire County Council): Wessex Live Labs – net zero corridors.
Statement of Support – Milestone Infrastructure
Milestone Infrastructure is proud to be supporting Devon County Council on the LiveLabs2 project for the A382.
Accelerating carbon reduction and carbon negative initiatives into this scheme will provide valuable learning for the industry as a whole, as well as providing the opportunity for Devon County Council, Exeter University, and Milestone Infrastructure to showcase the green skills and capability in the South West of England.
The project complements Milestone’s ambitions for safer, greener highways, and provides the opportunity to aim beyond net zero and target carbon negative status; an industry first.
Statement of Support – University of Exeter
Dr. Dan Lash at the Centre for Energy and the Environment, University of Exeter (UoE), has been working with Devon County Council on highways infrastructure projects for a number of years.
This has included quantifying greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from new capital schemes, developing tools for Devon County Council to use in-house to improve design and decision making around capital and maintenance projects, and working more widely with the sector to produce guidance aimed at harmonising approaches to GHG quantification.
Through this, it has become apparent where the current limitations both in quantifying emissions, and the opportunity to drive those emissions down through the design and construction process are.
The UoE is happy to be supporting Devon County Council on this Live Labs project at the A382, as it will place GHG impacts ‘front and centre’ in the decision making process for the project.
This has the potential to both deliver a very low impact scheme, and for the lessons learned to be applied more widely within the sector.