Iain Soutar's blog

Exposure and interrogation of some of the common assumptions around innovation can help to flesh out the interplay between nexus study and innovation, and what this interplay means for transformation more generally.

By engaging with a range of stakeholders, Stepping Up is seeking to understand how innovations shape impacts across the nexus of water, energy and food systems, today and into the future. This blog reports on two recent workshops exploring the future of one of our chosen innovations: anaerobic digestion (AD). 

The value of an innovation lens for nexus studies

I was fortunate enough to participate recently in a three day workshop on the ‘Energy-Water-Climate Change Nexus in a Transitional Economy: Sustainability and Resilience’, held in Nanjing, China at the end of May, hosted jointly by Nanjing and Lancaster Universities. This blog summarises the work I presented as part of the Stepping Up project, and reflects (albeit belatedly!) on both the workshop and some of the conversations had throughout.

A previous blog introduced four Water, Energy, Food-nexus (WEF)-relevant innovations which together form the principal focal points of Stepping Up. We will use case studies of these innovations to establish an understanding of their potential for scaling up to address WEF-nexus challenges. These innovations are anaerobic digestion, insects as a novel source of protein, and the social as well as technical recovery of value from surplus food.