News: Sep 01, 2021
Chalmers allocates 1 Million SEK per year during the period 2020-2024 to support a broad engagement of Chalmers researchers in the Centre for Sustainable Urban Futures.
The funds are primarily used for seed projects to develop and test ideas through, for example, pre-studies or pilot projects around challenges and areas of interest for Urban Futures and its partners. The overarching goal of the seed projects is to support involvement and up-scaling of activities.
Through long-term co-operation and engagement in Urban Futures the center’s partners take a joint responsibility to meet the societal challenges our cities and regions are facing. All partners are all welcome to initiate projects in close collaboration with Chalmers researchers. However, seed money from this call can only be used for Chalmers researchers.
The partner organisations include; Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg University, The Gothenburg Region (GR), City of Gothenburg, IVL Swedish Environmental Research Institute, RISE Research Institutes of Sweden AB, County Administrative Board of Västra Götaland and Region Västra Götaland.
The funds are managed by the Department of Architecture and Civil Engineering (ACE) in accordance with the principles of the Chalmers Areas of Advance, with interdisciplinarity throughout Chalmers, challenge-driven focus and cross-sectoral cooperation.
The call for seed projects conducted 2022 is now open.
Submission deadline: 22 October 2021
For more information, please contact Liane Thuvander, liane.thuvander@chalmers.se.
Chalmers together with its partners, is engaged in the Centre for Sustainable Urban Futures (Urban Futures). Urban Futures is a research and knowledge center that works with sustainable urban development to realise the fair, green and accessible city and aims to be an arena for joint knowledge production between practice and research. Through long-term co-operation and engagement in the Centre, the partners take a joint responsibility to meet the societal challenges our cities and regions are facing.
As Chalmers actively wants to contribute to Urban Futures and foster a broad engagement among researchers at Chalmers, we ask you to apply for seed projects. A seed project may be a pre-study, pilot study, in-depth literature study or similar and should result in a larger project application. The overarching goal of the seed projects is to support involvement and up-scaling of activities.
Urban Futures has identified two focus areas: 1) A just climate transition: challenges and opportunities and 2) Organizing and leadership for sustainable urban development. The seed projects should link to one of the focus areas.
The ambition is that the seed projects will form the basis for developing knowledge and collaborations with long-term value for the partners involved, who work together to create funding for research projects and shape Urban Futures.
Important dates
Submission deadline: 22 October 2021
Notification: 10 November 2021
Projects must be finished at latest: 31 December 2022
Partners in the Urban Futures Consortium
The partners in the Urban Futures and contact details can be found here.
Details of the call
• The project should include at least one researcher from Chalmers and at least one of the public partners (Göteborgsregionens kommunalförbund, Göteborgs stad, Länsstyrelsen i Västra Götalands län or Västra Götalandsregionen) from the Urban Futures consortium, the involvement of several partners is encouraged.
• The project leader should be from Chalmers.
• The project should contribute to the development of the knowledge fields of Urban Futures and sustainable urban development
• The budget should be between 150 kSEK and 250 kSEK, including indirect costs (OH). The budget can cover personnel costs but cannot cover costs for equipment or travel costs to conferences or similar events. The total budget of the call is 750 kSEK, which will allow for 3-5 projects.
• Seed money from this call can only be used for Chalmers researchers.
• The project must be finished in December 2022.
The proposal form
The application should be maximum 2 pages long, font Times–roman, size 11. In addition, max 1 page can be used for references. A one-page CV of the main applicants should be included (max 2 CVs). Proposals that do not comply with this format will be desk rejected (no review process).
The proposal should include
a) the project title and the project abbreviation
b) name, e-mail, and affiliation (department, division) of the project applicants
c) the research challenges addressed and the objective of the project; interdisciplinary aspects should be highlighted; also the applicant should discuss how the project contributes to sustainable urban development and relate to the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
d) the project description
e) the expected outcome and the plan for further research and funding acquisition
f) the project budget and time-line
Evaluation Criteria
• Innovative research idea
• Possibility of further research and joint funding applications
• Budget and project feasibility
• Relevance for Urban Futures and Chalmers research strategy
• Credibility of collaboration between academia and public partners
Submission
The application should be submitted as one PDF document to: liane.thuvander@chalmers.se
The proposals will be evaluated by Liane Thuvander (Assoc Prof ACE), Jonas Nässén (Senior Researcher SEE), Fredrik Nilsson (Head of Department ACE), and a representative from Urban Futures.
Questions can be addressed to Liane Thuvander, liane.thuvander@chalmers.se.
