Behind the lens
Featuring round windows that represent air bubbles and stepped in a sloping hill conveying the feeling of cascading water, the new facility on Streatham Campus conceptualises water flow, which is central to its research mission.
Created and funded in partnership between the University of Exeter and South West Water, the Centre for Resilience Environment, Water and Waste (CREWW) is the first purpose built, Net-Zero-in-Operation research centre in the water sector, building on many years of collaboration between the two organisations.
CREWW will lead pivotal interdisciplinary research, bringing together our best minds from across multiple disciplines with industry experts at South West Water, to discover solutions that will make a difference to peoples’ lives and protect the future of water systems in the South West, the UK, and on a global scale.
Managing natural resources to ensure there is enough water to cope with population growth and climate change, improving the resilience of our water infrastructure to cope with floods, droughts and pollutants, creating sustainable water networks and supply solutions, and preventing pollution and microplastics in our water supply, are some of the most pressing issues we face. Together, this new space will allow CREWW to develop a shared understanding of these issues, so that we can co-create engineering, nature, economic and behaviour-based solutions that will make a lasting positive impact to communities and ecosystems around the world.
The new centre is providing our teams and other external partners with access to the very best facilities and state-of-the-art laboratories to conduct research that will have a positive impact on the future of water supplies.
The CREWW Building builds on our University’s strategic ambitions of creating a greener, healthier, fairer world.
CREWW researchers are already making huge strides in collaborative, solutions-focused research. For example, South West Water’s Upstream Thinking project, a research project led by CREWW, is focused on investigating pollution sources and water management processes upstream in catchments. Research partners are working with landowners and land management organisations to implement changes to deliver huge benefits to the quality of drinking water, as well as ecosystem protection and enhancement, representing a truly progressive way of working to safeguard water resources for the future.
Other CREWW projects include a Microplastics Lab, where researchers are using state of the art facilities and equipment to lead significant understanding of microplastics in South West Water (SWW) operations; and the Groundwater Infiltration Risk Mapping project, a pilot study of SWW’s sewer network to enable operatives to proactively investigate sites at high risk of pollution events.
The CREWW Building builds on our University’s strategic ambitions of creating a greener, healthier, fairer world. Through collaborative research and innovation, we will together lead meaningful actions against the climate emergency and ecological crisis, protecting and enhancing our natural environment.
Sustainability is one of the fundamental principles of the building’s design and the facility achieved “Net Zero in Operation” status from day one of opening, pointing us firmly in the direction of achieving Net Zero across the University. The building’s innovative design is also a blueprint for future builds at the University.
Not only that, but it will also be a living laboratory, a place in which energy and water efficiency is continually monitored, analysed and optimised. The building itself will provide valuable insights and offer up discoveries that can help support partners around the world to achieve their own Net Zero targets.
The CREWW facility was part funded by a £10.5 million (UKRPIF) grant from Research England and significant investment from both the University and South West Water.
CREWW is the only water sector facing partnership to receive support from the UK Research Partnership Investment Fund (UKRPIF), as well as being the largest supported RPIF-sponsored project in the South West.
