£25,000 of funding is available for artwork and arts facilitation, to inspire collective action towards sustainable digital research infrastructure. Proposals from artists, arts collectives, or teams of makers are encouraged to be submitted for consideration by Friday 14 October 2022 at 12:00pm (GMT). 

The Centre for Environmental Data Analysis is pleased to offer this funding opportunity, as part of the UKRI Net Zero Digital Research Infrastructure Scoping Project.

This funding comes from UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. UKRI brings together seven Research Councils – including the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) – Innovate UK, and Research England.

The Centre for Environmental Data Analysis is leading the UKRI Net Zero Digital Research Infrastructure Scoping Project on behalf of UKRI and, with direction from AHRC, this arts funding opportunity.

From supercomputers to staff laptops, we are working towards making all the digital tools and practices used for UK research carbon neutral. We expect the environmental impact of this ‘digital research infrastructure’ to be significant and complex. 

To meet the ambitious sustainability target – of reaching net zero digital research infrastructure by 2040 – a broad transformation will be required. We need to understand what digital research infrastructure exists and how it is being used, and its future. 

Our roadmap towards carbon neutral digital research infrastructure will involve UK researchers from across disciplines and take an integrated and coordinated approach.

We see great potential and value in a role for the arts within the net zero digital research infrastructure transformation.

We envisage the artwork design and making process will stimulate engaging conversations across the research community. As part of the commission we anticipate conversations to be facilitated by, or in collaboration with, the commissioned artist or maker. 

We hope the final artwork, and the processes by which it was created, encourages people to look at the challenge of net zero for digital research infrastructure from a fresh perspective and inspire collective action.

The artwork will be launched as a talking point at an online event in May, and beyond – in a gallery space to be confirmed. 

The purpose of the online event is to communicate our project’s final recommendations – about how to achieve net zero for digital research infrastructure – and encourage engagement with the roadmap across the UKRI community. 

The event will include people from a range of backgrounds, roles and responsibilities. People’s knowledge about the digital research infrastructure net zero roadmap is likely to be very varied – some people will have actually been doing the work, others may only have just heard about it. The final artwork will be a way to stimulate conversations about the project with these people.

£25,000 of funding is available. Proposals from artists, arts collectives, or teams of makers are encouraged to be submitted for consideration by Friday 14 October 2022 at 12:00pm (GMT).

Take a look at the briefing document, which includes full details about the opportunity, budget, timescales and how to apply. 

If you have any questions about the brief, or need to discuss the format of your proposal, please contact either:

Poppy Townsend, Communications Manager, Centre for Environmental Data Analysis – poppy.townsend@stfc.ac.uk 

Harriett Richardson, Communications Manager, National Centre for Atmospheric Science – harriett.richardson@ncas.ac.uk