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As Live Labs 2 continues through Year 4, Programme Director Giles Perkins reflects on the growing recognition for the programme – and what these awards tell us about the high calibre of innovation, collaboration and emerging talent behind it.

There’s a phrase we can now officially use about Live Labs 2: award-winning.

Across the programme, our Live Labs, projects and people have picked up an extraordinary range of awards, commendations and nominations spanning across highways, transport, construction and local government.

These are not easy awards to win. The competition across these industries is incredibly strong, with our projects being judged alongside some of the best work being delivered across the sectors. To be winning these awards and consistently appearing on shortlists, is something everyone involved in Live Labs 2 should be enormously proud of.

So what does this recognition tell us?

For three years, Live Labs 2 tested new approaches to decarbonising local roads. Since April, Year 4 has been about taking that evidence and learning out across the sector and helping others turn innovation into practical action.

The awards give us a measure of how strongly that dissemination work is resonating and how clear our messaging is.

Questioning the fundamentals

Perhaps the most striking example is East Riding.

Its Decarbonising Street Lighting project has now won 10 national awards, spanning environmental sustainability, net zero, digital technology, AI, innovation and decarbonisation.

These include the Highways Awards Environmental Sustainability Award 2025, DfT Net Zero Project of the Year 2025, Highway Electrical Association Project of the Year 2025, two Decarbonising Transport Awards 2026, the ADEPT President’s Award for Deploying Digital Innovation & Technologies 2026, LGC Innovation Award 2026, CIHT Decarbonisation Award 2026 and the MJ AI Innovation in Local Government Award 2026.

That breadth is interesting because the project started by questioning something fundamental: when rural street lighting reaches the end of its life, is conventional renewal always the safest or best option?

What followed was not simply a carbon project. The work has demonstrated opportunities to reduce costs and carbon while maintaining safety, using digital technology and evidence to challenge established practice.

And importantly, it is now moving beyond the trial stage. The approach is being expanded across East Riding, demonstrating exactly the kind of adoption we want to see coming out of Live Labs 2.

Recognising people as well as projects

There’s another aspect of these awards that I think is equally important.

They’re not just recognising projects. They’re recognising people too.

East Riding’s Karl Rourke received Special Recognition at the ADEPT President’s Awards 2026. Within our Centres of Excellence for Decarbonising Roads (CEDR), Lauren SeBlonka received the Highways UK Associate Laureate (Rising Star) Award 2025, while Annabelle Farrington received the DfT Special Recognition Outstanding Achievement Award for Level 4–6 Apprenticeship 2026.

For me, that matters enormously as we see first-hand how invested the Live Labs projects are.

Innovation doesn’t happen because somebody writes it into a programme plan. It happens because people are given the opportunity to test ideas, work with new technologies and partners, challenge established ways of doing things and learn from what happens.

Seeing emerging talent recognised alongside established professionals and major projects is therefore an important part of the Live Labs 2 story. We want the legacy of this programme to be not only new evidence, tools and approaches, but people with the skills and confidence to continue challenging the sector.

Recognition across the programme

And it isn’t confined to one Live Lab.

CEDR has won the Highways UK Excellence Awards Net Zero Award 2024 and the RSTA Asset Management Award 2025, alongside further industry recognition and shortlists.

Liverpool has won Best Local Transport Project at the Decarbonising Transport Awards 2026 and the CN Awards Collaborative Supply Chain Award 2026, alongside CIHT commendations, regional recognition and multiple Highways UK shortlists.

Devon’s A382 project has been commended for collaboration and highly commended for sustainability, as well as reaching the finals of awards from Construction News, the Highways Awards, British Construction and Infrastructure Awards and Green Awards UK.

Wessex has also been shortlisted for Net Zero Project of the Year at the LCRIG Strictly Highways Awards 2026.

This is a broad breadth of recognition. We’re seeing Live Labs 2 associated with sustainability and decarbonisation, as you would expect, but also collaboration, asset management, digital technology, AI, construction, innovation and people development.

That feels important because Live Labs 2 has never been about finding one technology that will decarbonise local roads. It has been about changing how we think, how we make decisions and how we work together.

What the awards really mean

Of course, we shouldn’t measure the success of Live Labs 2 by the number of trophies on ‘dusty shelves’.

But neither should we underestimate what this level of recognition means.

These are highly competitive awards. Live Labs 2 projects and people are standing alongside leading projects, organisations and professionals from across highways, transport, construction and local government. Being recognised in that company gives us useful external validation that the ideas being tested here have relevance beyond the programme itself.

The awards help shine a light on the work. Our job now is to use that attention to encourage others to look at the evidence, talk to the people behind it and consider what they could adopt themselves.

Importantly, Year 4 is about getting those ideas out there through our regional workshops, Triage sessions, industry events, resources and direct engagement with local highway authorities.

The trophies are something everyone involved should be proud of alongside the important legacy of innovation, collaboration and emerging talent they represent.  We are taking award-winning ideas and people and using that momentum to help make better ways of working business as usual.

Further information

• The ADEPT website features a new, AI-powered large language search model, making it easier for local authorities and industry professionals to quickly access reports, toolkits, project blogs, evidence and resources from across the Live Labs 2 programme. Simply navigate to the top right-hand corner of the ADEPT website to find the Ask AI function and use it to search for what you need from the Live Labs 2 projects.
• For more information on ADEPT Live Labs 2: Decarbonising Local Roads in the UK, please look at the Live Labs 2 section on the website
• The next Triage session will take place on Tuesday 8th September between 14:00-16:00 - find out more and register for a future session
• You can find resources from the Live Labs 2 programme here. 

Author

Giles Perkins is Programme Director for Live Labs 2