Synthetic Biology, Water Industry and the Performance of an Innovation Barrier

This paper analyses the performance of a research programme that sought to address issues of innovation in the water industry through the application of synthetic biology approaches to water problems. We use this analysis to re-imagine the problem of innovation in the UK water sector. Using textual, observational and interview data, we examine how a series of discourses have, over time, become firmly connected in the context of water innovation. Discourses include: 1) conceptualisation of public actors as consumers who are ignorant of the complexities of water and its true value; and 2) the primacy of market-based mechanisms to produce innovation. We show how these discourses shaped the expectations of academic and industry actors as they sought to use synthetic biology as a solution to industrial problems. Expecting innovation barriers of a certain form, these actors performatively helped to construct the very thing they sought to dismantle.