The University of Cambridge, through its Schofield Centre and NRFIS, have received European Union funding to support the integration and advancement of innovative cutting-edge infrastructure research across Europe.
The existing European infrastructure is facing major challenges. The impact of climate change, extreme weather, geo-hazards, aging and increased usage in combination with changes to meet long-term goals, such as energy transition, have all played their part.
The funding received is part of a new four year GEOLAB project (2021 – 2025), supported by the EU H2020 Research and Innovation Programme, to integrate and advance key national research facilities to address the challenges of critical infrastructure across Europe in the water, energy, urban and transport sectors. The Schofield Centre and NRFIS are among 11 unique research facilities funded through GEOLAB to support the study of subsurface behaviour and engineering interaction with structural critical infrastructure elements.
GEOLAB stems from the need for greater coordination, networking and interaction across the European research landscape. Until now, research within individual institutions has been largely independent and uncoordinated, significantly limiting the scope of outcome for use by academia, industry and critical infrastructure network managers.
Through integrating key national research facilities across Europe, GEOLAB aims to combine and coordinate their activities in the disciplines of subsurface behaviour (soil mechanics and hydrogeology), engineering (geotechnical, structural, engineering geology and environmental) and data science (ICT, advanced data analyses and virtual access), thus enabling cross-boundary innovative research.
GEOLAB proposes to make advances such that it enables a one-stop-shop for outstanding modelling research that will achieve:
- Efficient, standardised data exchange between the research facilities;
- Re-use of open experiment data sets and virtual access;
- Reinforced partnerships with industry, academia and stakeholders;
- New users attracted to the research infrastructure;
- Ground breaking research using the innovation in modelling and measurement techniques;
- Effective research and innovation across scales and disciplines based on guidelines and interoperability.
The Cambridge funding will be used facilitate transnational research access to the Schofield Centre and NRFIS. Transnational access will be the backbone of the GEOLAB project- mobilising cooperation across and within disciplines and enabling cutting-edge research to address the challenges faced by the critical infrastructure networks.
The University of Cambridge is one of 10 GEOLAB partners offering access to 11 experimental research facilities across Europe. Other partners include Delft University of Technology (Netherlands), University of Maribor (Slovenia), Technical University of Darmstadt (Germany), Swiss Federal Institute of Technology - ETH Zürich (Switzerland), Université Gustave Eiffel (France), CEDEX (Spain), Deltares (Netherlands), Norwegian Geotechnical Institute (Norway), and consultancy firm KPMG Future Analytics (Ireland).