Engineering Matters

#94 Barriers to Data Rich Design

18 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Construction has not always recognised the value of using data from past projects to deliver better results in the present. It often finds itself star...

#93 Tomatoes and the Road to Net Zero

11 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Something remarkable is happening in East Anglia. Waste heat from sewage treatment is being pumped into two enormous greenhouses creating low carbon h...

#92 The Most Flooded Town In England

04 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode we partnered with WSP to tell the story of Looe, a fishing port in Cornwall. The small town has the dubious accolade of ‘most floode...

#91 Global Risks and Shapeshifting Infrastructure

28 Jan 2021

Contributed by Lukas

With the weight of the built environment exceeding that of the total biomass for the first time, the human impact on the planet has passed a symbolic ...

#90 The New Way to Plan a City

21 Jan 2021

Contributed by Lukas

The data quality in the planning and development sector is appalling. Whether supplied in this form accidentally, negligently, or recklessly does not ...

#89 Blue Lanes in the Black Country

14 Jan 2021

Contributed by Lukas

A revolution is happening in the UK, and it is happening quietly. Inspired by the Copenhagen Bicycle Account, Bike Life is the biggest assessment of c...

#88 Engineering Trees

07 Jan 2021

Contributed by Lukas

It is tree planting season in the UK. With their amazing carbon storage ability, flood alleviation capacity and biodiversity boosting potential, trees...

#87 So That Was 2020

29 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Welcome to the very last Engineering Matters of 2020!  In this episode we go back to some of the biggest stories that we covered over the past...

#86 Enterprise Delivery: A Model for Recovery

22 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

With a £100bn capital spending plan, the biggest ever investment in new transport infrastructure and a ten-point plan for climate change, the UK is d...

#85 Concrete’s Role in the Climate War

17 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Contributing around 8% of global climate emissions, concrete is a major source of carbon. It is also essential, and no major project is feasible witho...

#84 Asphalt of the Future

15 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Have you ever walked past a newly surfaced road, perhaps around the corner from your house… and wondered when it will next be resurfaced? Side roads...

#83 Digitisation and the road to diversity

10 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode we look at how the demands of the industry are becoming increasingly diverse, resulting in a similar change in the people carrying out...

#82 Securing the Shugborough Tunnel

08 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Set in the West Midlands county of Staffordshire is a former Royal Forest called Cannock Chase. It is part misty, secluded woodland and part undulatin...

#81 Zen and the Art of Programme Management

03 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

The adoption of healthy or unhealthy behaviours at project reviews can have an enormous impact on the overall project and even the wider industry.&nbs...

#80 Covid 19: Construction Copes with the Pandemic

26 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

It is by now a topic that sadly needs little introduction. It has impacted everyone in the last year. Changed lives and livelihoods, overturned entire...

#79 Rebuilding Zandvoort’s Rollercoaster Racetrack

19 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode we look at the Circuit Zandvoort, the iconic post-WW2 racetrack in the Netherlands. Beloved by fans of all flavours of motorsport, it ...

#78 Reinventing invention

12 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

A revolution is approaching manufacturing, one that will see costs and time to market cut by as much as 50%. The digitalisation of engineering will re...

#77 Floating Turbines: Offshore Wind’s Game Changer

05 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Until a few years ago the offshore wind industry was constrained by the seabed characteristics of countries seeking to harness the generating capacity...

#76 Building with Biomaterials

29 Oct 2020

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode we have partnered with Autodesk Construction Solutions to look at a new approach to housing construction in Kenya.  We take a ...

#75 Last Howl of the Vulcan

22 Oct 2020

Contributed by Lukas

The Vulcan is one of the most iconic aircraft ever flown by the Royal Air Force. Although not quite the household name that the Spitfire has been, it ...

#74 Weaving a New Data Fabric for Infrastructure

15 Oct 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Imagine a world where Alexa can tell you the latest, greenest, safest and most cost-effective way to design, deliver or operate something. Advice on d...

#73 How to Build a Digital Twin

08 Oct 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Anglian Water currently enjoys a daily surplus of 150 million litres of water, but this is forecast to become a 150 million litre deficit by 2045. To ...

#72 Seeing the Himalayas: Kickstarting Net Zero

01 Oct 2020

Contributed by Lukas

On a bright morning in April, people in the city of Jalandhar in the state of Punjab stood out in the streets and saw something breath-taking… somet...

#71 Stewards of the Soil

24 Sep 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Historically civilisations have sprung up wherever the land was most fertile, soils that supported good crop productivity to meet the food requirement...

#70 On Track for a Rail Revolution

17 Sep 2020

Contributed by Lukas

The railway network in the UK is old and vast and home to the first public railway to use steam locomotives in the world. The Stockton and Darlington ...

#69 Artificial Intelligence in Infrastructure

10 Sep 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Maintaining a tunnel requires many hours of dedicated work by highly skilled engineers. And as our network of tunnels expands, so does the maintenance...

#68 The Future of Design

03 Sep 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Changes to the way we do design are coming; construction is languishing at the bottom of the productivity rankings, now below hunting and fishing.&nbs...

#67 The Future is Remote and Autonomous

27 Aug 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Remotely operated vehicles, uncrewed surface vessels and ever-increasing autonomy are removing personnel from dangerous work offshore in the North Sea...

#66 Fever Screening in Airports

20 Aug 2020

Contributed by Lukas

As a small island trading nation, Britain risks killing its economy and losing millions of jobs, unless it can allow people to get back to work in as ...

#65 Every Little Helps

13 Aug 2020

Contributed by Lukas

At the start of the Covid-19 lockdown, one of the few reasons people were allowed to leave their homes was to shop for the basic essentials.  ...

#64 EDAROTH

06 Aug 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Manchester – the city has been on the cutting edge since the birth of the industrial revolution. From John Dalton’s Atomic Theory in 1803, to the ...

#63 Nine Days to Build a Hospital

30 Jul 2020

Contributed by Lukas

When Dan Harmer received a call in March that told him to clear his schedule and prepare for a meeting, he knew it would be important, but had no idea...

#62 The Washing Machine Project

23 Jul 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Hundreds of millions of people in the most economically disadvantaged places in the world spend up to 20 hours per week washing clothes by hand. This ...

#61 Countdown to British launch

16 Jul 2020

Contributed by Lukas

On 28 October 1971 the UK conducted its first and only successful orbital launch, firing the Prospero satellite into low earth orbit – LEO on a ...

#60 Covid 19: Creating safer spaces

02 Jul 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Britain is emerging from some of the toughest social restrictions placed in peacetime history. As people come out of their homes, they are eager to me...

#59 Empowering Ethical Engineering

25 Jun 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Engineers are in a uniquely powerful position. Able to shape our built environment and so influence the direction of civilisation, the impact that the...

#58 Construction declares climate emergency

11 Jun 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Since mid-2019, over 900 architectural practices in the UK have made a declaration of climate and biodiversity emergency, acknowledging the extreme se...

#57 Printing versus the pandemic: COVID 19

28 May 2020

Contributed by Lukas

The coronavirus pandemic that has torn through society has also seen supplies of personal protective equipment (PPE) depleted at an alarming rate. As ...

#56 The Biodiversity Emergency

14 May 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Biodiversity in the UK is facing an emergency with around 30 percent of native species becoming extinct since the 1970s. This loss of wildlife, which ...

#55 Saving Structures with Satellites

30 Apr 2020

Contributed by Lukas

How data from satellites can track structural movement, and give early warning of potential failure. New research shows that catastrophic bridge colla...

#54 Keith Bannerman: A life underground

17 Apr 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Carving out underground space for railways, roads, waterways, urban development and even fishing and farming is how some people spend their entire...

#53 Technology vs biology: fighting COVID 19

03 Apr 2020

Contributed by Lukas

As cases of COVID 19 explode, the World Health Organisation is urging countries around the world to learn from South Korea. Before even recording its ...

#52 Tunnelling Podcast: Propping up Luton Airport’s new rail link

27 Mar 2020

Contributed by Lukas

How a new 2.5km cable pulled railway will connect Luton Airport’s terminal to the UK rail network boosting future growth. Today rail passengers arri...

#51 Covid 19: Disaster Resilient Infrastructure

20 Mar 2020

Contributed by Lukas

The rapid and exponential spread of the new coronavirus, COVID 19 is changing the way that we live and work. First detected in December 2019 in Wuhan ...

#50 Dealing with Nuclear Waste

13 Mar 2020

Contributed by Lukas

The UK has a legacy of 600,000 tonnes of nuclear waste being held in temporary storage facilities at 30 sites around the country. It is enough to fill...

#49 Uncharted waters: Flooding and drought

05 Mar 2020

Contributed by Lukas

This winter a series of weather bombs detonated across the UK, overwhelming river systems and overtopping flood defences. River levels were off the ch...

#48 Paving the way in pothole prevention

27 Feb 2020

Contributed by Lukas

How nematode worms, 3D printing and drones could revolutionise our approach to maintaining road surfaces. According to the RAC we are 1.5 times mo...

#47 Breathalysing Whales: Drones Revisited

20 Feb 2020

Contributed by Lukas

An update on our Drones episode from January 2019 where we learn about new uses for unmanned aerial vehicles, and celebrate being shortlisted for thre...

#46 Metro stations: The gateway to the city

13 Feb 2020

Contributed by Lukas

A tremendous change occurred with the industrial revolution: whereas it had taken all of human history until around 1800 for world population to ...

#45 Offshore Wind, Part 2 : Foundations for the Future

06 Feb 2020

Contributed by Lukas

How new technology is supporting the UK’s offshore wind industry to bring down costs and accelerate construction. From new methods for drilling into...

#44 Offshore Wind, Part 1: Becoming a World Leader

30 Jan 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Over the past two decades the UK has become the world’s leading offshore wind energy producer. Not only is it responsible for 40% of all offshore wi...

#43 Virtual Reality: transforming design

23 Jan 2020

Contributed by Lukas

From new immersive technologies to life saving applications, virtual reality is finally meeting up to expectations of the 1990s and transforming the w...

#42 Surviving a tunnel fire

16 Jan 2020

Contributed by Lukas

This week we are bringing you an episode of our newly launched Tunnelling Podcast, made in partnership with the British Tunnelling Society.In March 19...

#41 Crunch Time for Net Zero

09 Jan 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Last year the UK set a legally binding target to become carbon neutral by 2050, ahead of any other major global economy. In doing so it took the first...

#40 Becoming a Role Model: Ying Wan Loh

24 Dec 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Becoming a Role Model: Ying Wan Loh From rotary drilling on Mars to hybrid-electric aviation and the expansive global supply chains of the aeronaut...

#39 Heathrow: Leading the digital charge

19 Dec 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Heathrow has announced an ambitious expansion plan that will add a third runway and take the airport to cope with growing demand up until 2050. It cal...

#38 Temporary Heroes: Construction’s Unseen Infrastructure

12 Dec 2019

Contributed by Lukas

What do the Great Pyramids of Giza, the Ipswich Barrier and Heathrow Airport have in common? None of them could have been realised without a complex n...

#37 Solving the Productivity Puzzle

28 Nov 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Historically, the nation’s productivity has improved with economic growth, but since the global financial crisis and despite the UK’s recovery, pr...

#36 The Calculator that Could Save the World

21 Nov 2019

Contributed by Lukas

How a calculator is helping countries around the world to lower their greenhouse gas emissions and create more sustainable energy systems. When Pro...

#35 The Quantum Enabler: Professor Sir Peter Knight

07 Nov 2019

Contributed by Lukas

As Quantum computing becomes a 21st century reality, Professor Sir Peter Knight explains why controlling the register of quantum bits that make up a q...

#34 Crisis Shelter for Mass Displacement

31 Oct 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Noorullah Kuchai is a civil engineer, a humanitarian and a refugee twice over. He lived in a tent in a Pakistani refugee camp for a decade and is now ...

#33 Future Factories: Driving forward industry 4.0

17 Oct 2019

Contributed by Lukas

World leading smart robotics, industry disrupting technologies and the next generation of augmented reality are just some of the advances in action at...

#32 The untold story of Eiffel and his Tower

03 Oct 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Had its use as a gigantic 300m high radio antenna not been recognised in the early 1900s the magnificent Eiffel Tower, would have been pulled down and...

#31 Creating a National Digital Twin

19 Sep 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Back in December 2017 the UK’s National Infrastructure Commission set the UK a huge challenge: to create a digital model of our national infrastruct...

#30 Interviewing Dad: Atkins President Philip Hoare

05 Sep 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Chloe is 16 and interested in an engineering career. She is also the daughter of Philip Hoare, President of engineering consultant Atkins. To find out...

#29 Innovations in Renewable Energy: Lorna Bennet

22 Aug 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Growing up in a tiny village in rural Scotland, regular power cuts would leave Lorna Bennet and her family without electricity for days on end. Determ...

#28 Building for Biodiversity

08 Aug 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Habitat for the UK’s Great Yellow Bumblebee has declined 80 percent over the last century thanks to the loss of the flower rich meadows that sustain...

#27 Recycling Plastic into Roads

26 Jul 2019

Contributed by Lukas

After 844 trial tests, and setting his own street on fire, founder of Scottish start-up MacRebur Toby McCartney finally hit on a viable solution for r...

#26 Saving Rossington

16 Jul 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Placing the United Nations’ sustainable development goals at the heart of projects can regenerate UK communities. From a new 4km road link that ...

#25 Return of the Fatbergs

27 Jun 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Underneath cities all over the UK subterranean mountains of calcified fat are gathering in our sewers as fat, oil and grease stick to baby wipes and h...

#24 Unleash the Hydrogen Potential

13 Jun 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Could the lightest element in the periodic table be the answer to the world’s most weighty challenge of decarbonising energy? Hydrogen is the most a...

#23 Becoming an astronaut: Sophie Harker

30 May 2019

Contributed by Lukas

It was a meeting with the first Briton in space, Dr Helen Sharman, that changed the course of Sophie Harker’s life forever. A maths student at The U...

#22 Electric Excavators: Cities cut carbon in construction

21 May 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Since 1913 the world’s most famous flower show has been held every Spring in Chelsea in London. This year among the electric blue Persian Slippers, ...

#21 Electric Aviation: Meeting demand for low emission flight

09 May 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Norwegian airline Widerøe needs a new fleet of planes to serve its regional passenger base. But it doesn’t want to buy conventional aircraft. It wa...

#20 Electric Vehicles: Lessons from world leading Norway

03 May 2019

Contributed by Lukas

How did Norway become the world’s most successful electric vehicle market? Last month almost 80 percent of all new cars sold in Oslo were EVs and ac...

#19 Future of 3D Printing

18 Apr 2019

Contributed by Lukas

From additive manufacturing in space, to 3D printing customised pharmaceuticals and non-planar electronics, the next revolution in 3D printing is alre...

#18 Cocoa Power

04 Apr 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Four thousand years after it was first used as a form of nutrition for the Olmec people of Mesoamerica, engineers are finding new ways to harness the ...

#17 Acting on climate change

21 Mar 2019

Contributed by Lukas

As young people all over the world protest over political inaction on climate change, we ask how engineers can prevent our planet’s temperature risi...

#16 Designing green buildings

08 Mar 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Rudi Scheuermann Do plants hold the key to making cities healthier? Could we design buildings that don’t take away green space, but create it...

#15 Engineering Elephants: Brittany Harris

22 Feb 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Providing water and sanitation after a destructive military revolution in Peru; engineering with elephants in Kenya; and plunging into enormous po...

#14 The Bridge Man: Dr Robin Sham

08 Feb 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Dr Robin Sham How did a circus act inspire a revolutionary new construction method for Scotland’...

#13 Secrets of the Hoover Dam

27 Jan 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Are there really bodies buried in the Hoover Dam? Was the hard hat really invented here in 1931? And why was it originally called Boulder Dam? In this...

#12 The Drone Boom

03 Jan 2019

Contributed by Lukas

No-one knows how many penguins are in the Antarctic, but thanks to the use of drones this is set to change as scientists are using these unmanned aeri...

# 11 The robots are here

23 Dec 2018

Contributed by Lukas

Robots are not just coming. They are already here. From TyBot which can tie steel reinforcement into position on bridges, to the road marking wizard L...

#10 How China has automated road design

30 Nov 2018

Contributed by Lukas

With 4.8 million kilometres of road China sits third in the world in terms of length of highways behind only the US and India. But its huge investment...

#9 The race to create Hyperloop

19 Nov 2018

Contributed by Lukas

Right now companies around the world are competing in a global race to prove that a new transport revolution is just a few years away. Using high spee...

#8 Cargotecture: scaling up shipping container construction

30 Oct 2018

Contributed by Lukas

Floating along Copenhagen’s central waterway is a new proposition in affordable student accommodation, Urban Rigger. Each of these 745m2 units start...

#7 The woman who built Trump Tower

15 Oct 2018

Contributed by Lukas

The story of how Brooklyn born maths genius Barbara Res became head of construction for Trump Tower, despite deep-rooted sexism that sat at the heart ...

#6 Minecraft: inspiring young engineers

01 Oct 2018

Contributed by Lukas

The story of how schools, colleges and professional institutions are working with Minecraft Education Edition to inspire the next generation of young ...

#5 Community Power: solar gains for villagers

19 Sep 2018

Contributed by Lukas

How a small village in Buckinghamshire developed and delivered a clean, green, solar energy project that generates enough electricity to power over 10...

FIRE 4: New tech for a safer future

28 Aug 2018

Contributed by Lukas

From apps that can tell building residents what to do in a fire, to smart psrinklers and localised external fire detection and suppression, new techno...

FIRE 3: In event of a fire use the lift

21 Aug 2018

Contributed by Lukas

In the event of a fire do not use the lift, use the stairs. We have been conditioned to fear using an elevator to escape a fire. But one major London...

FIRE 2: Incentivising good practice

14 Aug 2018

Contributed by Lukas

In the second of our series of podcasts examining fire safety in tall buildings we ask how can developers of tall buildings be incentivised to build i...

FIRE 1: Making buildings safer

07 Aug 2018

Contributed by Lukas

Now is the time for change when it comes to fire safety in tall buildings. The catastrophic events at Grenfell Tower in London on 14 June 2017 have be...

#4 The Rise of the Digital Twin

23 Jul 2018

Contributed by Lukas

Digital twins are revolutionising business models for aviation, industry and engineering. These virtual replicants of assets enriched with real time a...

#3 Worms and plastic: a waste treatment revolution

09 Jul 2018

Contributed by Lukas

The UK in now at war with waste plastic creating major new opportunities for the waste industry. In January Prime Minister Theresa May published a new...

#2 Lost in spaces

25 Jun 2018

Contributed by Lukas

Satellite based global positioning systems have revolutionised navigation outdoors and now software engineers are bringing the same innovation to indo...