It provides scientific and technical capabilities to research and industry partners to accelerate demonstration and pathway to market for technologies focused on clean fuels, and industrial digitalisation advancing processes in several key areas of sustainability: biomass/waste gasification, carbon capture, chemical synthesis from sustainable feedstock, advanced formulation and digital manufacturing.
Located in the James Chadwick Building, in the middle of The University of Manchester campus, the Industrial Hub for Sustainable Engineering is spread over three floors and 200+ m2. It is designed to link academia with industry, to bridge the gap between fundamental research to pilot scale by providing industry partners with access to the facilities, experts and support services to test and operate TRL levels 5-6.
Its capabilities include:
- Cutting edge facilities, analytical equipment and instrumentation to test and validate new concepts such as the biggest high-pressure chemical looping hydrogen plant fully integrated in the world (from September 2024)
- A new integrated plant for sustainable aviation fuel and methanol synthesis using a variety of reactor types at relevant conditions (from January 2025).
- A unique integrated system to test, design and operate any unit with the next-generation Siemens Process Control System (PCSneo)
- Pilot scale equipment to train the next-generation chemical engineers such as a 2-storey absorption column, continuous distillation froth flotation equipment, and facilities to study mixing and formulation (the biggest in UK)
The Hub can run multiple processes at the same time allowing closer integration along the whole value chain. Alongside, it provides significant added-value benefits for industry partners including:
- Derisking upscale and techno-economic analysis of novel sustainable technologies
- Expertise of academic staff in sustainable technologies
- Full support of highly qualified technical staff
- Experience in long-standing Academy/Industry collaboration
- Funding application support through University dedicated teams
- Joint project support management through University dedicated teams
The Hub is also committed to supporting the skills agenda. It provides a research-driven chemical engineering curriculum for students, educating the next generation of chemical engineers.
Our impact
Due to its bespoke offering, the Hub has already secured a portfolio of £7 million research collaborative projects for its first two years of operation via the Wolfson Foundation, the Department of Energy Security and Net Zero, and UKRI Prosperity Partnerships.
Speak to our experts

Dr Vincenzo Spallina
Reader in Chemical Engineering and Academic Lead for the James Chadwick Building
- Lead of the Sustainable Process Intensification group at The University of Manchester
- Research experience as Principal Investigator and Co-Investigator in collaborative projects funded by EU Commission, UKRI, Department of Energy Security and Net Zero with an overall research income of £ >5million since 2018.
- Research expertise in the area of gas-solid reactors applied to low-carbon hydrogen and chemicals production
- Experimental and modelling activities to develop new process concepts in the field of waste recovery, biofuels, carbon capture and utilisation
- Research and development to scale-up new technologies from material development to demonstration scale

Professor Lev Sarkisov
Professor of Chemical Engineering
- Lead of the Computational Material Design group at The University of Manchester
- Leadership experience as Head of the Chemical Engineering Department at The University of Manchester (2020-2022)
- Research experience as a principal investigator and co-investigator in international collaborative projects with academia and industry
- Expertise in molecular simulations of adsorption, process modeling, multiscale approaches to process design and optimization, machine learning methods in material design, and adsorption processes for carbon capture

Dr Igor Bulatov
Project Manager for the Industrial Hub for Sustainable Engineering
- Chemical engineering background and research in the field of energy- and material-saving technologies and process integration
- Managed 12 projects (total budget ca £18m) with and through university and industrial teams of which coordinated 5 multinational and national projects.
- Project technology transfer, communication, dissemination, and exploitation activities