Ofwat Launches Water Breakthrough Challenge 3

Support is offered to water companies from England and Wales, together with private sector partners, to develop bids addressing the sector’s most pressing challenges.

The Water Breakthrough Challenge has been created to reward businesses developing innovative solutions to the water sector’s biggest environmental challenges, benefiting society and the environment.

The current competition is called ‘Breakthrough 3’, comprising two streams of funding. Through the Catalyst Stream, approximately £8 million is available for entries seeking funding of between £150,000 and £2 million. Through the Transform Stream, approximately £30 million is available for entries seeking funding of between £2 million and £10 million per entry.

The Catalyst Stream aims to encourage new ways of working that go beyond business-as-usual innovation practices in the water sector, in particular, increasing and improving collaboration and building partnerships from within and outside the water sector.

The Transform Stream aims to spark ambitious innovation and enable new approaches and ways of working, equipping the water sector to address the big challenges facing the sector, driving far-reaching and long-lasting benefits across England and Wales, now and into the future.

Both streams require lead entrants to be a water company in England or Wales, however the Catalyst Stream allows for entry leads to delegate project management responsibilities to their partners.

The deadline for the Catalyst Stream is 8 December 2022. The Stage 1 deadline for the Transform Stream is 9 November 2022.

(This report was the subject of a GRANTfinder Newsflash.)