ONE Planet - NERC DTP2

The ONE Planet Doctoral Training Partnership will fund and train a new cohort of PhD students across environmental science disciplines. This matters because the UK needs a steady pipeline of skilled researchers who can tackle complex environmental challenges—from climate change and biodiversity loss to pollution and natural resource management. Traditional PhD training often operates within single disciplines, but many environmental problems cut across geology, ecology, atmospheric science, and hydrology. This programme creates a structured, multi-institution consortium that gives students broader training, access to diverse expertise, and exposure to real-world problems. The potential impact is a generation of scientists better equipped to work across boundaries—between academic fields, between research and policy, and between science and industry. These researchers will go on to work in universities, government agencies, environmental consultancies, and NGOs. The programme does not target a specific technology or product; it is a training investment. Similar past doctoral training partnerships have produced leaders in climate modelling, conservation biology, and environmental regulation. The immediate output is skilled people, not a single discovery.