Funding for robotics training facility in West Cumbria

The Engineering Construction Industry Training Board (ECITB) has awarded £250,000 in Regional Skills Hub funding to a new robotics training facility in West Cumbria.

The Cumbria Robotics Operations Skills Centre (CROSS)  has been developed collaboratively to build the robotics-skilled workforce needed to deliver the UK’s nuclear and clean energy ambitions.

Plans for the centre of excellence were first announced in April, with the collaborative venture involving the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA), National College for Nuclear and Clean Energy (NCfN&CE), the Robotics and Artificial Intelligence Collaboration (RAICo), Sellafield Ltd and its supply chain, and Lakes College.

The project has already secured £1m in funding from UKAEA through the Foster programme, including providing state-of-the-art equipment to equip the CROSS facility.

The extra funding from the ECITB, which comes from the industry-led skills body’s investment in Regional Skills Hubs, will support the delivery of the hub, such as developing the curriculum, short bite-sized courses and teaching resources and the expansion of technical and sector-relevant content beyond the centre’s initial focus on the nuclear sector.

ECITB Chief Executive Andrew Hockey said: “The ECITB is delighted to support this innovative project in Cumbria from our Regional Skills Hub funding, which targets capacity- building projects like this in the UK’s industrial heartlands. “Industry intelligence shows there is currently a lack of industry-applicable robotics training available for careers in the engineering construction industry (ECI).

“A key pillar of the ECITB’s Leading Industry Learning strategy under the Transform pillar is to  drive technology adoption through training to allow industry to harness new technologies, including robotics.

“This project and the new, cutting-edge CROSS facility help meet this objective by delivering much-needed robotics training to benefit Sellafield nuclear site and other ECI sectors in the future.
“Our investment and collaboration with project partners positions the ECITB at the heart of emerging ECI robotics modularised training development and roll-out.”