The "AI for Sustainable Future" Competition, hosted by the Regional Centre of Expertise Ningbo on Education for Sustainable Development (RCE Ningbo) and co-organized by OHFI Asset Management (OHFI), has recently successfully completed the first round of review. A total of 145 participants and 48 teams entered the competition. Among these, 28 teams submitted entries in the social practice category and 20 in the technological innovation category. After intense competition and a rigorous review, seven teams stood out from all the contestants for their creativity and potential, securing a place on the shortlist, with a selection rate of only 14.6%. We extend our warmest congratulations to all the shortlisted teams!
Rooted in Ningbo, this competition targets students from six universities in the broader Ningbo area, namely Ningbo University, NingboTech University, Ningbo University of Technology, Zhejiang Wanli University, Ningbo University of Finance and Economics, University of Nottingham Ningbo China. Focusing on the cutting-edge theme of "Artificial Intelligence and Sustainable Future", the competition sets up two tracks: "Technological Innovation" and "Social Practice". It aims to encourage students to break disciplinary boundaries and explore, from a forward-looking perspective, the paths and solutions for artificial intelligence (AI) to empower the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Teams shortlisted in the first round will receive a project funding of RMB 10,000 to support their in-depth research. Moreover, the final round offers a generous top prize of RMB 30,000, designed to inspire the creation of excellent innovative achievements.
Let's take a look at the fantastic showcases from the shortlisted teams!
(Listed in alphabetical order based on the team leader's last name.)
-- Technological Innovation
Project 1
This project designs an AI-driven “PV Priority + Load Regulation + Energy Storage Coordination” system for campus energy management at UNNC. Using simulation, machine learning, and reinforcement learning, it dynamically optimizes solar, grid, and storage scheduling. The system enhances photovoltaic utilization and efficiency, reduces waste, and supports sustainable green campus development with strong practicality and scalability.
Team Members: Shuaichen Ge, Yi Zhang, Yishu Chen
Affiliation Name: University of Nottingham Ningbo China
Team Advisor: Dr Zhiang Zhang, Associate Professor in Building Services Engineering and Building Physics
Group Number: G02_Technological Innovation
Project 2
To address the pain point of insufficient activation and utilization of cultural relics, "Huimeng Guzhen" (Dream-Drawing for Ancient Treasures) takes model distillation and multimodal fusion as its core, and builds three major modules: an Intelligent Cultural Relic Knowledge Base, a Cultural and Creative Interactive Platform, and a Mini Programme. The Knowledge Base relies on digital twins and knowledge graphs to construct a cultural relic knowledge system. The Platform uses AI to realize anthropomorphic IP design of cultural relics and user portrait generation, creating artworks that integrate history and innovation. The Mini Programme combines social interaction and cultural and creative customization, forging a new paradigm of cultural and technological integration and driving the dual upgrading of knowledge dissemination and cultural and creative consumption.
Team Members: Tianao Luo, Zhuoyuan Deng
Affiliation Name: Ningbo University of Finance and Economics
Team Advisor: Dr Xin Li, Associate Professor; Dr Yaqian Shi, Lecturer
Group Number: G20_Technological Innovation
Project 3
The NOVA (Nexus for Optimizing Validated Atmospheres) is a sustainable AI stability and energy consumption optimization solution for cleanroom environmental control systems, developed by the University of Nottingham Ningbo China team. The project leverages cutting-edge technologies like Artificial Intelligence and Digital Twin to address critical cleanroom issues such as high energy consumption and poor stability, enabling intelligent environmental sensing and dynamic energy efficiency optimization.
The core innovation lies in its plug-and-play integrated architecture of “Algorithm + Data + Hardware”. The product assists with the intelligent and green transformation of cleanrooms, supporting the implementation of the Carbon Peaking and Carbon Neutrality Strategy (Dual Carbon Strategy), and delivers significant economic and social value.
Team Members: Jia Wang, Mengxi Zheng, Yuecheng Xu
Affiliation Name: University of Nottingham Ningbo China
Team Advisor: Dr Fengfeng Xie, Assistant Professor in Management Science and Analytics
Group Number: G05_Technological Innovation
Project 4
To address the high-risk and low-efficiency issues in traditional wind turbine tower inspection, this project introduces "Eco-ClimbInspect" -- a magnetic wall-climbing robot. It integrates lightweight edge AI vision and dry-coupled ultrasonic testing for automatic, non-stop inspection with dual-modal defect recognition.
Key innovations include a cascaded detection strategy, low-power edge deployment, and coordinate-based data archiving. The system enhances safety, coverage, and traceability, supporting smarter maintenance and carbon reduction in wind power.
Team Members: Haoming Yan, Xiaozhou Gai, Haoyi Tu, Qitao Jiang
Affiliation Name: University of Nottingham Ningbo China
Team Advisor: Dr Qianyu Liu, Assistant Professor in Electrical and Electronic Engineering
Group Number: G19_Technological Innovation
-- Social Practices
Project 1
Nowadays, the protection and scientific research work on Eurasian otters on Jintang Island is bringing enormous opportunities and challenges to the local area. This project aims to empower ecological cultural tourism and protection with AI, creating replicable technology and operation models.
A digital otter knowledge base will be built through research data, and an AI virtual character "Tata" will be launched. Activities such as online live broadcasts and interactive tours will be carried out in combination with AR/VR and other technologies. The core innovations are the "AI + IP" dual-drive and the "cultural tourism - scientific research - protection" collaborative model, which will enhance the public's environmental awareness, drive tourism revenue to feed back into scientific research, inspire residents to actively participate in protection behaviors, and achieve a high degree of unity of ecological, economic and social values.
Team Members: Yu Li, Tianhong Li, Jiachen Qu, Zhuojun Yu
Affiliation Name: University of Nottingham Ningbo China
Team Advisor: Prof Zhao Cai, Head of Department of Entrepreneurship, Marketing and Management Systems, Professor in Information Systems
Group Number: G15_Social Practices
Project 2
To scientifically protect rural dialects and respond to the State Council's dialect protection requirements, this work creates the AI "Local Sound Archive" digital platform.
It collects dialect audio via WeChat Mini Programme, realises speech transcription and annotation with AI technology, pushes learning content based on user characteristics and sets up point incentives, innovatively building an online closed-loop system. The platform supports UN SDG4 (Quality Education) and SDG11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities), aiming to cover over 20 provinces in 3 years to promote dynamic dialect inheritance.
Team Members: Qi Qi, Yizi Wu
Affiliation Name: Ningbo University of Finance and Economics
Team Advisor: Dr Saier Su, Associate Professor of Ningbo University of Finance and Economics
Group Number: G07_Social Practices
Project 3
This project addresses SDG12 and the challenges within the online food delivery industry by developing an intelligent system to assess the comprehensive health performance of merchants in food safety, nutritional health, and environmental sustainability.
Utilizing multimodal AI technology, it integrates analysis of food images and textual reviews to innovatively construct a multi-dimensional health index. Its value lies in providing data-driven support for platform governance, offering improvement directions for merchants, and guiding consumers toward sustainable choices, thereby promoting responsible production and consumption in the sector.
Team Members: Runjie Wan, Weier Bao
Affiliation Name: University of Nottingham Ningbo China
Team Advisor: Dr Boying Li, Associate Professor in Marketing
Group Number: G18_Social Practices
For this round of the competition, we are honored to have invited the following three judging experts:
Professor Jing Dai
Director of Regional Centre of Expertise Ningbo on Education for Sustainable Development
Mr Xiaoxing Jing
Head of Factor Development at OHFI
Ms Yihan Qin
Head of the AI Technology Group at OHFI
Leveraging their profound academic and industry expertise in sustainability and artificial intelligence, they conducted a professional evaluation of each team's project proposals and works across multiple dimensions, including technical feasibility, commercial value, and social impact. Based on this assessment, they selected the 7 shortlisted teams mentioned above.
Read More: https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/dQZNfkl2vDRA5yI852iZ7w