The University of Oxford’s Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment and Bank of America today announced the renewal of their partnership. Now in its fourth year, the partnership supports new research into the technologies and market forces set to shape the future of energy.
The announcement comes at a pivotal moment, as governments, businesses and investors make far-reaching decisions about how to expand and modernise energy infrastructure while maintaining secure, reliable and affordable supplies.
Led by Professor Doyne Farmer and Oxford’s Complexity Economics programme, the research will focus on two areas with major implications for the UK and global economy: the future of energy storage and the development of next-generation fuels for sectors that are difficult to electrify, including aviation.
Using advanced economic modelling, the researchers will examine how technology costs, infrastructure, policy, geography and company behaviour interact over time. The aim is to identify where bottlenecks may emerge, which technologies have the greatest commercial potential and where investment could deliver the greatest economic impact.
These questions are central to UK energy security and industrial competitiveness. The growth of variable power generation is increasing the importance of storage, transmission and grid management, while aviation and other energy-intensive sectors need commercially viable alternatives to conventional fuels. By examining these technologies alongside the evolving roles of nuclear, oil and gas, the research will provide a real view of how the energy system could develop.
Fernando Vicario, UK Country Executive at Bank of America, said: “Secure, reliable and affordable energy is fundamental to economic growth. Delivering it will require innovation, robust analysis and significant long-term capital.
“Oxford’s research will help identify where technologies can scale, where constraints may emerge and where investment can have the greatest impact. We are proud to renew our partnership and support independent research that can help inform decisions across business, finance and government.”
The programme builds on Professor Farmer’s previous work challenging conventional assumptions about the cost of transforming the energy system. A peer-reviewed study published in 2022 found that a rapid transition to a largely decarbonised energy system by around 2050 could likely save the world $12 trillion in energy-system costs compared with continuing the existing fossil-fuel-based system.
The new programme will extend this data-led approach to some of the most pressing and uncertain questions facing the energy system today.
Professor Doyne Farmer, Baillie Gifford Professor of Complex Systems Science at the Smith School and Director of the Complexity Economics programme at the Institute for New Economic Thinking, said: “Decisions we make today about technology, infrastructure and capital will shape the energy system for decades.
“Our modelling captures the real-world interactions between companies, markets, technologies and costs. It will reveal where risks, bottlenecks and investment opportunities are likely to emerge across storage and future fuels.
“Our earlier work showed how misleading conventional assumptions can be. This partnership gives us the opportunity to bring the same empirical rigour to the next generation of energy challenges.”
The renewed partnership combines Oxford’s research expertise with ongoing involvement from energy and finance practitioners. It will continue to build on the thousands of stakeholders engaged by the partnership to date, convening Bank of America clients, employees and leaders from government, academia and business. This dialogue will help ensure the research addresses the challenges facing market participants, while remaining academically independent.
A partnership with a record of impact: The renewed collaboration builds on Bank of America’s previous support for Oxford Smith School, where the bank’s seed funding enabled Oxford to leverage an additional £4million+ in funding.
The bank’s funding and support has also enabled researchers in Sustainable Food Solutions to develop their work, meet potential collaborators and build up their research network. In turn this has opened doors to collaborators working on Brazilian livestock systems, tracking and tracing illegal livestock movements and trade-offs in farming systems. Researchers are now working on field trials with around 100 Brazilian farmers who own close to 15,000 hectares of farmland and 35,000 cattle, with preliminary results indicating that giving farmers the right information can help reduce their emissions by almost 20%.
The new programme is expected to produce academic and policy-facing publications over the next three years, supported by continued engagement with businesses, investors and policymakers.