Client
Government Office for Science
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Service
Explore
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Length of project
6 months
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Is our marine future autonomous?
What does community engagement have to do with shipping and making it captain-less (if that's a thing)? Turns out, more than you may think.
The Government Office for Science was seeking to understand the Future of the Sea – its conservation, technologies, and economic potential. What they needed was an understanding of the potential role that autonomous vessels could play. That is where we came in.
We were tasked with identifying the challenges facing marine autonomy in the UK, what future challenges there are likely to be, and what the Government should be doing to engage marine communities in its potential. After all, fewer captains could mean fewer jobs. Or more jobs making autonomous vessels.
Our task in this project was to gain the insights from the autonomous marine sector in the UK, and the communities affected by them. So we delivered a programme of research, in partnership with the University of Southampton, to tease out these insights.
The Government Office for Science was seeking to understand the Future of the Sea – its conservation, technologies, and economic potential. What they needed was an understanding of the potential role that autonomous vessels could play. That is where we came in.
We were tasked with identifying the challenges facing marine autonomy in the UK, what future challenges there are likely to be, and what the Government should be doing to engage marine communities in its potential. After all, fewer captains could mean fewer jobs. Or more jobs making autonomous vessels.
Our task in this project was to gain the insights from the autonomous marine sector in the UK, and the communities affected by them. So we delivered a programme of research, in partnership with the University of Southampton, to tease out these insights.
100
People who we spoke to.
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12
Project ideas developed
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We first held 30 stakeholder interviews with leading companies and researchers in the UK. We asked them what the major challenges are to autonomous marine deployment in the UK, and how these challenges are likely to change in the future.
This engagement was followed by a one-day policy making workshop, held at the University of Southampton. 100+ participants, including local people, were guided through a workshop where they identified further challenges to marine autonomy in the UK, and had the ability to question those that we had developed.
We then took the participants through an exercise where they identified potential solutions to these issues, collaborators to help deliver these solutions, and specced out a business case for them. The leading solutions were voted upon, with a commitment from government secured at the workshop to investigate their feasibility further.
This engagement was followed by a one-day policy making workshop, held at the University of Southampton. 100+ participants, including local people, were guided through a workshop where they identified further challenges to marine autonomy in the UK, and had the ability to question those that we had developed.
We then took the participants through an exercise where they identified potential solutions to these issues, collaborators to help deliver these solutions, and specced out a business case for them. The leading solutions were voted upon, with a commitment from government secured at the workshop to investigate their feasibility further.
Outcomes
The evidence from our report formed part of the evidence base for the Future of the Sea Foresight Report. This was published in 2018.
We also published a post on the Government's Foresight Blog.
We also published a post on the Government's Foresight Blog.
"Thank you for the excellent workshop. It was just what we wanted!"
Henry Green, Government Office for Science
"I loved the workshop format. It made for a really engaging discussion, and created loads of ideas. I can't wait to read about them in the report."
John Murray, Society of Maritime Industries
Henry Green, Government Office for Science
"I loved the workshop format. It made for a really engaging discussion, and created loads of ideas. I can't wait to read about them in the report."
John Murray, Society of Maritime Industries