Engineers from around the world gathered at the Postal Museum in London for the Engineering Matters Awards 2025, presented in partnership with the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, IMechE, and Engineers Without Borders UK, EWB UK. The awards celebrate the impact that engineers have on people and the planet. This year, Gold Champion trophies were awarded to adi Group, ABB, Fido, Keltbray, the Lightyear Foundation, National Highways, Red Pitaya, Rolls Royce, and Sellafield Centre of Engineering Excellence.

A celebration of impact

Each year, the Engineering Matters team selects a venue for the award that itself celebrates the impact of engineering, and the awards evening starts with a private tour of the venue. In 2024, the awards ceremony was held at the Cutty Sark, one of the fastest sailed ships ever built. This year’s awards were presented at the Postal Museum, and featured a ride on Mail Rail, the Post Office Underground Railway profiled in the Engineering Matters episode, Building Bandwidth in the 1920s.

After a ride on the train, and a chance to chat with other attendees in the exhibition space, guests made their way to dinner. Engineering Matters’ regular hosts Rhian Owen and Johnnie Dowling introduced two guest speakers, Joyce Achampong, associate director, impact, with IMechE, and John Kraus, chief executive, EWB-UK.

Kraus talked about the work of Engineers Without Borders. EWB UK works to support the sector, and to help engineers deliver impactful work. As John told attendees, “Many people starting their career in engineering arrive with great academic credentials. But we need more than that. We need people who can work in a team, who can communicate well and who can see the connections in complex problems

“More and more we need people who can understand what responsible engineering is all about. People with a mindset that’s attuned to the increasing demands for sustainability.” Kraus invited guests to support EWB’s work, and asked them to learn more on the EWB UK website.

Achampong highlighted how the awards, and the work of IMechE, celebrate the impact of engineers, saying, “Tonight, we are not only celebrating innovations in technology, we’re celebrating  the engineers behind them: those with the courage to imagine solutions for the complex and urgent challenges that face society. Engineers have long been stewards of progress and now, more than ever, your role is central to solving the ‘grand challenges’ which shape the future of our world.”

Champions of impactful engineering

After dinner, Owen and Dowling returned to the stage for the serious business of the evening: highlighting the impact of attendees’ work. First up was the Diversity & Inclusion award. This award recognises organisations and projects that have helped open the industry to a wider range of employees.

This was a tightly contested category, with three nominees receiving gold. Alan Lusty accepted the Gold Champion Award on behalf of adi Group, for its work on developing a pre-apprenticeship programme for school children, informed by his own experience of building an engineering business, without following a traditional academic path. 

The Lightyear Foundation was awarded Gold Champion in the Diversity & Inclusion category for its working with schools serving students with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) to put on interactive STEM workshops. The foundation works with children of all ages to engage them in STEM, and to mentor them through finding work.

Sellafield Engineering Centre of Excellence’s Gold Champion Trophy was awarded for its work with SEND schools, putting on workshops and career days to encourage students into STEM. The workshops are designed to individual schools’ needs and help older students find work placements and jobs within engineering. 

The Engineering Matters Awards aim to celebrate projects at every stage of development. As well as the Gold Champions, the judges select Bronze and Silver Champions. Broadly, Bronze awards are handed out to projects that demonstrate strong potential for impact. Silver awards celebrate well-developed ideas. And the Gold awards go to projects that are fully developed and demonstrably ready to be emulated by others.

Not every category will include a gold champion. That was the case this year in the Health & Safety category. While the entrants this year were all worthy of Bronze and Silver certificates, the judging panel felt that none had quite reached the peak of their potential impact. 

The next Gold champion was Rolls-Royce, in the community category. This category celebrates work that delivers benefits to local communities. Katie Jarman, assistant chief engineer, space programmes, Rolls-Royce Novel Nuclear, had identified a need in local schools for tutoring in mathematics, an area where some local children were struggling. After many years of work by Jarman and her fellow volunteer tutors, the programme has helped hundreds of children make progress in this subject.

After these three people-focused categories, attention turned to the planet. In the first of these categories, Sustainability, more than twenty entrants received awards. This category aims to celebrate the achievements of engineers that play a significant role in reducing waste, recycling materials or reusing materials.

In this category, Keltbray received Gold for their development of HIPER Pile, a system that reduces materials use in piling. The judges were particularly impressed by recent work to incorporate geothermal energy into the hollow HIPER piles, dubbed HiperEnergy.

Another packed category came next: Net Zero. This award highlights the work of engineers who are helping to reduce carbon emissions, and protect the climate. Two entrants were selected by the judges as Net Zero Gold Champions: ABB, and National Highways.

The National Highways team received their award for their work with Connected Places Catapult, developing an accelerator programme for low carbon startups.  The judging panel selected the accelerator for its success in identifying start ups and innovators, and matching them with established companies who could help bring these ideas to viability.

ABB were awarded Gold Champion for their work repowering a haul truck at a quarry in Turkey, for their client NUH Cement. The judging panel were particularly impressed by the graceful solution ABB found, based on working conditions at the site. With loads of materials being carried down from the quarry, and the trucks making their uphill journey empty, ABB were able to use regenerative braking alone to supply the power needed. While this approach depends on site conditions, the process of identifying new ways to power vehicles made a real impact.

The final impact category of the night awarded engineers for their impact on the environment. The Gold Champion trophy was handed to Red Pitaya, manufacturers of cheap, flexible, and powerful multifunction measurement tools. These use open source software, and high performance sensor inputs. The devices allow innovators to scale up their ideas, and bring them to market. As an example of this flexibility, Red Pitaya has supplied equipment to LongPath Technologies, helping them to develop a laser-based system for methane monitoring. 

The formal business of the night ended with the judge-selected Innovation Award. With so many inspiring ideas represented across the impact categories, more than twenty winners were selected. The Gold Champion in this category was FIDO, who have developed AI systems able to rapidly detect leaks in water supply pipes, using recordings of acoustics from within the system. The judging panel felt that this work, exemplified by a project with Thames Water, brought cutting edge information processing tools to bear on a problem of immense global importance.

As the last awards were handed out, and the tables were cleared, the band came to the stage, and attendees celebrated their successes with cocktails, dancing, and convivial networking.

The Engineering Matters Awards will return in 2026, with entries opening soon.