A Bath firm developing innovative bioplastic food packaging from seaweed has secured more than £3m to take its technology another step closer to everyday use. Sustainable biotech business Kelpi invented the unique compostable material to replace single-use fossil fuel plastics, which take hundreds of years to decompose. The seed round, led by Bristol-based specialist...
A new way to make money from dairy farm waste is to be commercialised by a start-up business founded by a former University of Bath mechanical engineering student. Frome-based BioFactory secured funding from Innovate UK and Defra for a 12-month feasibility study via the Farming Innovation Programme after developing a modular anaerobic digester (AD). ...
More than 100 firms across the West of England have signed up to a regional Good Employment Charter which pledges to pay staff a Real Living Wage and clamp down on the use of zero-hours contracts. Introduced by Metro Mayor Dan Norris as part of a campaign against poverty pay, it also commits employers...
Bath Spa University is celebrating possibly one of the most unusual accolades in its history – Gold Accreditation for being a hedgehog-friendly campus. The award, from the British Hedgehog Preservation Society, comes just a year after the university achieved Silver status. Hedgehogs are listed as vulnerable under the International Union for Conservation of Nature...
A spin-out company from the University of Bath is set to develop ultralight and low-carbon next-generation materials for the aerospace and automotive industries. Aerogel Core has been set up by engineers from the university to specialise in products containing innovative and environmentally friendly aerogels for use in soundproofing and heat shielding. The team’s research...
Bath’s long-awaited creative centre in the city’s former Stothert & Pitt crane works has been officially launched – with more than half the space already let. The once-derelict riverside buildings on Lower Bristol Road have been transformed by developer and regeneration specialists TCN into modern workspace of the type that firms in Bath’s burgeoning creative...
A hotel near Bath is to give discounts on overnight stays if guests commit to helping make it a more sustainable venue, including taking quicker showers and reusing towels. Bowood Hotel, Spa and Golf Resort, pictured, says the aim is to educate guests on its energy conserving practices by encouraging them to adopt sustainable...
The High Court has dismissed the legal challenge brought against the Planning Inspectorate’s permission for Bristol Airport’s expansion. The Planning Inspectorate decided last February to allow the airport to increase its annual limit on passengers from 10m to 12m after North Somerset Council rejected the plan, which includes major investment in the existing terminal building,...
A pioneering energy-based net zero housing policy being introduced by Bath & North East Somerset Council has been slammed as ‘undeliverable’ by the building industry’s trade association. The council has become the first in England to successfully adopt the move, which it sees as part of its commitment to tackling the climate emergency. It...
A new Institute for Sustainability that will bring together expertise in tackling the most pressing climate and sustainability issues has been launched by the University of Bath. Led by leading sustainability academics at the university, research at the institute will be focused around two themes: sustainable chemical technologies and sustainable systems. The sustainable chemical...
