Manchester leads SPRIng project

Manchester University announced today that it is leading a £2m project to develop new tools for assessing the sustainability of nuclear power.

The university has won funding from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) and Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) to lead a project to develop a methodology and decision-support system for assessing the sustainability of nuclear power, considering energy supply and demand.

The framework being developed will draw together technical, environmental, economic, social and governance perspectives to enable systematic, transparent and balanced assessment of nuclear power relative to other energy options – including renewables.

The Sustainability Assessment of Nuclear Power: An Integrated Approach (SPRIng) project is being led by Prof Adisa Azapagic in the School of Chemical Engineering and Analytical Science (CEAS) at Manchester University.

She said: ‘The outputs of this three-year project will have the potential to contribute to a better quality of life through improved understanding of the sustainability implications of the nuclear option compared to other energy options.

‘Given the importance of the subject and the interest in its outputs, the work has a potential to impact both the UK and the international scenes.’

Partners in the project include UK universities, large nuclear engineering companies, government departments, media organisations and NGOs.