Decarbonising our transport systems is a key engineering challenge on the path to net zero. This will involve changes to the ways and means by which people and things move around, at local and global scales. There is no single vision for how our transport systems will change and the interim steps to get fully sustainable transport systems, in which we already see changes.
In this Critical Conversation chaired by Academy CEO Dr Hayaatun Sillem CBE, we explored the need for and role of public dialogue in informing our transition to decarbonised transport. We were delighted to welcome Professor Nick Tyler CBE FREng, Professor Sarah Sharples FREng and Dr Jack Stilgoe as our expert panellists.
Mini series: Engineering and a just transition to net zero
Engineers play a critical role in showing how we can achieve socially beneficial outcomes, however, these must be shaped by wider society. Identifying these outcomes and their challenges needs conversations between publics, policymakers, researchers, innovators, and those that build the infrastructures we rely on. Having discussions about the futures we need to build, in relation to net zero, involves actively involving wider publics in the engineering sphere, and having real dialogue about what that is and how we get there.
This Critical Conversations mini series will explore the role of public dialogue in informing engineering’s response to the net zero transition and what pathways should be taken. The three topics will be energy, transport and built environment.
Critical Conversations
Bringing together the thoughts of leading experts from across the Academy’s networks, our Critical Conversations explore issues of relevance to global professional engineering community and wider society. Fellows, awardees, and engineering partners gather to tackle topical issues of relevance to the global professional engineering community and wider society.
You will be able to pose your questions to the panel during the live event via the comments section on LinkedIn.
Dr Hayaatun Sillem CBE
Hayaatun is CEO of the Royal Academy of Engineering and Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering Foundation. She co-chairs with the Science Minister the government’s Business Innovation Forum and co-chaired with Sir Lewis Hamilton his Commission on improving Black representation in motorsport. She is a trustee of various charities, member of the government’s Levelling Up Advisory Council and Digital Skills Council and NXD at construction company Laing O’Rourke. She has been named as one of the ‘Inspiring 50’ women in tech in Europe and one of the most influential women in both UK engineering and UK tech. She has a Masters in Biochemistry (MBiochem) from Oxford and a PhD from Cancer Research UK/UCL. She is a Fellow of the IET, Honorary Professor at UCL and Honorary Fellow at The Queen’s College, Oxford. She has received honorary doctorates from UCL, Imperial College London, Newcastle, Brunel, Huddersfield and Southampton, as well as a Science Suffrage Award and the Engineering Professor’s Council President’s Medal. She was a finalist for the Veuve Clicquot Bold Woman Award and was made a CBE for services to International Engineering in 2019. Prior to her current roles, she was Deputy CEO at the Academy and served as Committee Specialist and later Specialist Adviser to the House of Commons Science & Technology Committee.
Professor Sarah Sharples
Professor Sarah Sharples is Chief Scientific Adviser for the Department for Transport. She is a Professor of Human Factors in the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Nottingham and from 2018-2021 was Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Equality, Diversity & Inclusion and People. She has led research in transport, manufacturing and healthcare, and has a particular interest in designing systems that successfully integrate novel technologies and people in complex systems in settings including rail, highways and aviation. She was President of the Chartered Institute of Ergonomics and Human Factors from 2015-16.
Dr Jack Stilgoe
Dr Jack Stilgoe is a professor in science and technology studies at University College London, where he researches the governance of emerging technologies. He is part of the UKRI Responsible AI leadership team (www.rai.ac.uk). He worked with EPSRC and ESRC to develop a framework for responsible innovation that is now being used by the Research Councils. Among other publications, he is the author of ‘Who’s Driving Innovation?’ (2020, Palgrave) and ‘Experiment Earth: Responsible innovation in geoengineering’ (2015, Routledge). He previously worked in science and technology policy at the Royal Society and the think tank Demos. He is a trustee of the Royal Institution.
Nick Tyler CBE FREng
Nick Tyler CBE FREng is the Chadwick Professor of Civil Engineering at UCL and the Director of the UCL Centre for Transport Studies. Using his musician background, Nick combines highly diverse fields in his research and teaching, from science and engineering through to performing arts and policy. He created a multiscale multisensorial Person-Environment-Activity Research Laboratory (PEARL) to study the interactions of environments, people and their activities, from axons and dendrites to complex urban environments and vehicles; the laboratory is a “sort of Large Hadron Collider for studying human beings!”. This has resulted in changes in design of buses, trains, stations, streets and pedestrian facilities around the world.