Spring Accelerator 5
The next Spring Accelerator programme – addressing an Ambition inside WIS2050 Theme 6: Taking a Whole Life Approach to Responsible Consumption and Production – is looking for specific, implementable solutions that help the UK and Ireland water sector to minimise excavation and disruption to customers when repairing leaks.
Drinking Water Distribution Systems (DWDS) are the complex network of pipes and ancillaries that deliver treated water from centralised treatment facilities directly to consumers’ taps.
In the UK, these networks face significant challenges. The average water pipe in the UK is estimated to be 75-80 years old, with some pipes having been in operation for over a century. The extensive scale of the network and the associated costs mean that pipe replacement cannot occur at a pace that can reduce the overall age of the network. Aging pipes are more susceptible to deterioration due to corrosion, material fatigue, and environmental stresses (such as ground movement due to extreme weather conditions), leading to increased incidences of leakage and failures, making the DWDS increasingly difficult to manage.
Spring invites innovators to provide solutions for repairing drinking water pipes with minimal excavation, known as “low-dig” or “no-dig” technologies.
Successful solutions for Spring Accelerator 5 will significantly contribute to the sustainability and resilience of our water supply systems, help water companies meet and exceed regulatory targets, and safeguard resources for future generations.
Challenge timeline
Find out more about the Accelerator and how to apply.
The Spring Accelerator is an end-to-end innovation challenge process that has been created to identify innovative solutions that help address a significant need in the UK water sector, reduce the duplication of innovation efforts, and provide a path to faster adoption.
Each Accelerator programme launches a specific Call for Innovation which has been designed to address a specific Ambition inside one of the seven Water Innovation Strategy 2050 themes. Spring Accelerator 4 sites inside Theme 2: Providing Clean Water for All. You can see SA5’s Call for Innovation here.
Learn more about the Accelerator here.
The Accelerator is open to all innovators who have an idea or solution that addresses the challenge statement. Applicants may be individuals, businesses or a partnership between the two.
More detail can be found in the SA5 Terms and Conditions. Other information, including the application questions and scoring criteria, can be found in our Innovator Guidelines.
The goal of the Spring Accelerator is to speed up the process of finding, progressing, and adopting solutions to a given water industry challenge. This means that those who successfully navigate the accelerator process will go on to progress their solution with one or more water utilities. This could take the form of mentoring, a collaborative trial to test the solution in context, or anything in between.
Following Water Company engagement, Spring’s Knowledge Transfer service will provide easily shared project outputs, creating sector-wide project legacy and making it easier for teams to communicate the intricacies of their project to a wider audience.
At this time, financial support is not offered as part of the Spring Accelerator process. Project / trial delivery is at the discretion of the water companies involved.
Submissions to the Accelerator first undergo a review from Spring’s industry experts who will provide an initial assessment of the application.
Submissions will then be shared with subject matter experts who have been selected by each of the participating water companies. The subject matter experts will provide a second review of submissions and vote on the ones that they would like to be brought forward to the Innovation Exchange. Feedback is aggregated and sent to all applicants.
Applicants who are invited to the Innovation Exchange will have the opportunity to pitch their solutions to key water company stakeholders. These events go a lot deeper than a pitch, however; experts and decision makers from interested water companies will join applicants in a round-table like moment to start building a business case for mobilising the solution. Successful Exchange events end with commitment from multiple water companies to progress a solution.
More detailed information, including the application questions and scoring criteria, can be found in our Innovator Guidelines.
