UK news highlights
What with climate change negotiations, the cross-governmental Carbon Plan, Water White Paper, Electricity Market Reform, smart meter roll out, UK’s first Carbon Capture and Storage plant, red tape challenge, and lessons from Deepwater Horizon and Fukushima, it has been a busy few weeks for ESTH issues in the UK.
UK news – science & innovation
In his Autumn Forecast Statement, delivered November 29, Chancellor George Osborne pledged an additional £200 million for science infrastructure and heralded the Government’s Innovation and Research Strategy and Life Science Strategy which have since been published. This week, University and Science Minister, David Willetts, is visiting the U.S. to strengthen UK-U.S. links on education, science and research.
FCO and BIS Release their Science and Innovation Network Report: April 2010 to March 2011
On September 29, FCO and BIS co-hosted a lunchtime briefing for science attaches on the release of the new FCO/BIS “Science and Innovation Report: April 2010 to March 2011.” Speakers included FCO Science Advisor Dr. David Clary, BIS Director General for Science Dr. Adrian Smith, and Hugh Philpott, Head of the Science and Innovation Network (SIN). The presentation provided a very helpful overview of the work of the SIN Network in the 25 countries and territories in which it operates. In the U.S., they include officers at the UK Embassy in Washington D.C. and at UK Consulate-Generals in Boston, Houston, Atlanta, San Francisco and Los Angeles. For more details on specific collaborative activities, see the report itself. Also, very helpfully, the report includes at the end of the document the contact information for all SIN officers around the world.
Weekly highlights of UK news
Each week, we plan to bring you a mix of the latest eye-catching news from the UK Government across the ESTH spectrum. Here are some highlights from the last week.
At Conservative Party Conference in Manchester, the Prime Minister, David Cameron, told delegates that the new British economy will be built on “leading in advanced manufacturing, technology, life sciences, green engineering. Inventing, creating, exporting.” Read more 