Our vision is a world in which 'Active Buildings' can generate, store and release their own heat and electricity from solar energy. To deliver this, we research, prove and promote early commercialisation of building-integrated technologies that can capture heat and electricity from the sun and store it in a building until it is needed. We are also investigating the role for these buildings in our national energy and transport systems.

Some of the technologies are developed here by our research teams, who specialise in scale-up of technology from the lab to full-scale buildings. We also work with a wide range of business and academic partners to demonstrate and support early commercialisation of new renewable technologies and systems.

Buildings account for about 40% of global carbon emissions; in the UK they consume about 40% of all the energy produced. To address the energy crisis and reduce carbon emissions we need radical change in the way buildings are designed, built and integrated into our energy system: this is our mission. The SPECIFIC aims to transform Buildings into Power Stations by enabling them to generate, store and release solar energy. The centre brings together world class academic and industrial expertise in the fields of functional coatings, photovoltaics, solar thermal, batteries and chemical conversion, alongside unique pilot manufacturing facilities and business development expertise.

SPECIFIC is built on partnership: it is led by Swansea University with strategic industrial partners Akzo Nobel, NSG Pilkington and Tata Steel, and more than 50 other partners. SPECIFIC is part-funded by the European Regional Development Fund through the Welsh Government as well as the EPSRC.