Call for evidence outcome

Advanced Materials: Call for evidence - summary of responses

Updated 22 June 2022

Introduction

This summary covers the 86 contributions that came through from the public call for evidence (CfE) that closed on 18 March 2022. Contributions primarily consisted of returns from academia, industry (including SMEs) and trade bodies.

It should not be taken as the view, or opinion of, BEIS or HM government.

The summary starts with executive summary followed by a breakdown across the 4 CfE questions. Due to the commercial and policy sensitive nature of some responses, individual submissions will not be posted on GOV.UK. Owing to the natural links between ‘opportunities/challenges’ and ‘gaps’, those 2 questions have been brought next to each other in this summary. This should help with reading and understanding.

The order of points or suggestions should not be construed as reflecting BEIS’ priorities or endorsement of the contributor’s idea.

Next steps

This summary and raw submission information has been shared with the independent Advanced Materials Scoping Group.

As this was an information gathering exercise and not a consultation regarding, for example, potential HM government or BEIS new policy ideas or proposals, no further action should be expected.

Executive summary

This summary covers the 4 questions asked in the call for evidence. Contributors are referred to anonymously (as ‘contributors’).

No HM government view or indication of HM government policy should be taken from this summary.

As best as possible, the summary provides an objective overview of contributors’ returns. We encourage readers to refer to the full text of each question rather than relying on this shorter summary. Not all contributors agree, so there will naturally be some apparent contradiction/conflict between points or areas.

Headline: Reflecting the challenges/opportunities, there are gaps in the UK’s Advanced Materials area

Strategy and leadership

Many contributors spoke of the requirement to develop strong leadership via a UK strategy.

Commercialisation

Most contributors highlighted that the key challenge for the UK Advanced Materials area is around commercialising ideas. The UK has missed opportunities to pull through new Advanced Materials develop a new manufacturing sector.

Funding gap

Many contributors cited that there is a significant gap in support and enabling environment for both UK based supply chains and late-stage development and demonstration activities.

A recurring comment was that patient capital is required to mature technology from TRL 6 to TRL 9 (product use).

Net Zero

As in the opportunities section above, contributors said greater linkages within supply chains would make developing circular options and effective recycling more viable.

Others proposed a National Programme for the End of Life of Advanced Materials and said the circular economy approach in the UK could provide higher value to certain key sectors, such as reuse of waste materials.

Carbon fibre supply

Contributors highlighted that the UK has no domestic facilities for development or production of carbon fibres or their precursors. Contributors flagged that the global requirement for carbon fibre is predicted to out-strip global capacity by 2025.

Standardisation, verification and characterisation

Contributors highlighted the important role standardisation has to play in driving commercial success of Advanced Materials. They noted that ‘as these materials enter the marketplace, the [current] lack of standardisation contributes to customer confusion and could delay the large-scale adoption of UK-developed materials.’

Contributors suggested that we needed a dedicated UK centre for materials verification and assurance would bring scientists, application developers and engineers developing new materials and applications together with experts in metrology and provide access to emerging measurement knowledge and capabilities. This would fast-track future measurement protocols and standards that can accurately and reliably assess materials performance.

Skills

Contributors have noted a supply gap in the pipeline for relevant talent and skills in Advanced Materials. The main challenge in the UK for Advanced Materials is in maintaining a critical mass of skills in the discipline.

Whilst the UK materials science and engineering skills base is of high quality, there are a significant lack of women and people from ethnic minority backgrounds.

The education chain is hampered by a small number of universities provide degrees in materials science and engineering, with retainment in the sector also being low. Some said there is a trend for talented individuals to seek more lucrative careers in other areas – such as finance.

Headline: There are lessons we can learn from others

Countries

Materials has a higher standing in other countries than the UK; and, in contrast with countries such as China, Japan, European Union (EU) members, and the United States of America (US), the UK does not have a national Advanced Materials strategy.

Most contributors who answered this question proposed that the UK could learn from the US and Germany. For the US, their national labs attract significant amounts of funding (government and industry) to conduct and commercialise materials and materials manufacturing technologies. The National Science Foundation supports much longer programmes with the average duration for 2021 being nearly 3 years, whereas in the UK this is often the upper limit. Often cited was The Materials Genome Initiative. A similar initiative with a more focused approach – where the same concept is applied to specific materials or applications of interest – could prove very valuable and would provide the basis upon which the methodologies could later be expanded to other areas.

With Germany, their model is a more integrated ecosystem between all parties of materials development and use, which could be argued to lead to more effective identification and adoption of new and novel materials, and a stronger supply infrastructure. A number of contributors cited the Netherlands as an example of a smaller, yet additionally comparative, integrated strategy.

China was often cited as a country to learn from, with its focus on controlling the supply chain, using levers such as a strong presentation at standards committees at ISO, and its focus on commercialisation of academic discovery.

Companies

A lot can be learned from some of the most profitable companies, such as Tesla and SpaceX. Both companies started with different missions but realised the importance of Advanced Materials in their journeys. Even though their Advanced Materials products are not as widely known, they are key to their success.

And we can learn from our own achievements. The UK vaccine rollout was remarked upon by several contributors as a good example of what can be done with the correct political will and resources to rapidly scale up and deliver a novel complex material.

Headline: The UK has key strengths in Advanced Materials

The UK has excellent research and development strengths in Advanced Materials. From academic centres, like our universities, and innovation acceleration investments, like our Catapults, the UK has world-class invention and discovery expertise – particularly at the early research stage. The classic example of this is the discovery of Graphene’s properties.

The UK has successful and growing Advanced Materials companies. There are a number of successful and growing UK mid-size companies. Also, larger companies are able to take advantage of our Advanced Materials strengths; and, in doing so, enhancing the vitality of the UK Advanced Materials ecosystem.

The UK has standards and regulation strengths in Advanced Materials. Collaboration between academic centres and government partners with industry often leads to documentary standards, which are a key part of the innovation landscape.

Government has provided significant investment for Advanced Materials, which has encouraged private investment. the UK government has significantly invested in Advanced Materials via the Henry Royce Institute, High Value Manufacturing Catapult and other initiatives, like R&D tax credits.

Consultation questions

Are there any challenges and/or opportunities for UK Advanced Materials?

Opportunities – Net Zero and decarbonisation

Contributors have highlighted the opportunities for the UK in relation to Net Zero and decarbonisation via Advanced Materials. Contributors highlighted ‘Advanced Materials will also play an important role in the future of decarbonisation’, specifically how ‘there is an enormous number of applications for graphene in decarbonisation.’

Connected to this, a contributor highlighted additional opportunities around reducing ‘reliance on outsourcing (materials and manufacturing) by utilising indigenous resources; that we should achieve independence in Energy and Manufacturing while supporting our sustainable development goals.’

Initial steps indicate that the UK has the ‘building blocks of an integrated ecosystem via investments such as the Henry Royce Institute’, noting that this ‘investment has enabled the beginning of a broader integration of Advanced Materials research across disciplines, incorporating a significant focus on sustainability and circular economy, critical to the Advanced Materials of the future.’

One contributor has also raised the need to ‘consider the impact of the UK’s contribution to Advanced Materials and net zero globally.’ Also, others noted that ‘much of the focus for net zero is on what we can do in the UK to reduce our carbon footprint and greenhouse gas emissions at home.’ Some noted that some companies may derive the ‘majority of their current revenues from export markets’. In this lies an opportunity where ‘if appropriately integrated – and, in particular, industry and application-focused multi-scale models can be developed, from molecules to parts of Materials 4.0’ – the UK can ‘reduce emissions while channelling higher performance.’

Opportunities – UK Leadership

Other opportunities contributors put forward circle around the UK being able to lead in a specific aspect of Advanced Materials. One contributor highlighted that ‘with sufficient support, the UK can lead the world in the Advanced Materials that are critical enabling technologies for fusion energy.’ As well as with UK strength in nuclear materials modelling ‘there is an opportunity here for the UK to take the lead in materials assurance, greatly accelerating the development of novel concepts in fusion, fission, aerospace, and other key industries.’

Challenges – UK needs a strategy

Many contributors stated that a challenge for the UK within Advanced Materials is a lack of clear direction and vision. Contributors said the UK (meaning the UK government) needs ‘to develop a clear strategic vision and narrative for Advanced Materials that unifies disparate communities in academia, industry and government.’

A contributor has highlighted that ‘In stark contrast with China, US, Japan and certain countries in the EU, the UK does not have a National Materials Strategy’ the same contributor went on to say that ‘the UK situation is compounded by the diffuse accountability for materials across a variety of government departments.’ Leading to there ‘being no single champion for materials at the heart of government.’

Another contributor shared a similar sentiment who has called for ‘a roadmap for optimised future systems once these can be produced at scale in the future.’ It was also noted that such an action may help address current challenges as ‘this public-private investment will draw in private capital, where they see industry primes demand growing.’

And on a business growth front, one contributor highlighted that ‘there is a current lack of major UK strategic programmes, which reduces the opportunity for that transition piece between SME tech development and industry prime uptake.’

Challenges – Commercialisation of Advanced Materials

Perhaps the most pervasive challenge raised by contributors is that of commercialisation. Multiple elements of this challenge have been raised. Specifically, one contributor mentioned the challenge of creating a suitable regulatory framework to allow commercial opportunities to be realised.

More specifically in one part of the area: for nanomaterials a contributor said we often face ‘the challenge of progressing without sufficient alignment with the safety assessment of such novel materials.’ A similar point was also raised in regard to graphene: ‘there needs to be significant improvement on standardisation’ as ‘lack of a single definitive standard for graphene and other graphitic materials has had a detrimental effect on the commercialisation of graphene.’ We should, therefore, learn the lessons from graphene’s evolution.

Other contributors highlighted that there is, currently, a ‘disproportionate focus and resources being expended upon the research stage with little thought on the subsequent development, scale up and commercialisation that are required to bring the breakthrough to market, either from a practicality and feasibility perspective or from a time, finance, resources, knowledge and equipment perspective.’

This point is mirrored by others who recognise the important role universities have in new innovative research, but that ‘the suitability for transformation into possible industrialisation, start-up and commercial activities is usually poor, as the focus for researchers are on publications, less so on applied research with potential commercial outcomes.’

CfE contributors noted that the commercialisation challenge is not solely due to problems like scale up and industry uptake, but, as one contributor said ‘we also face competition from legacy materials and customers who do not yet understand the value of Advanced Materials like graphene. Education is a significant challenge which is currently shouldered predominantly by the organisations seeking to commercialise the materials.’

One contributor, in summary of others, noted that ‘while the UK has some world-leading academic expertise in materials relevant to these sectors, commercialising this research is often a challenge.’ In addition to this, they highlighted that crucial to addressing such challenges lies in the ‘availability of shared facilities to facilitate early-stage tech transfer or exploration is a challenge.’ They note that the Royce Institute is a positive step in this direction, coupled with the ‘City Deal investment in Northern Ireland, which will enable the Advanced Manufacturing Innovation Centre (AMIC) to speed up prototyping of new materials at a relevant scale.’

Another contributor suggested this challenge may be addressed via a ‘cross-sector innovation to commercialisation centre’, where ‘development of a new technology or material will not only be used to bring one product to market, but will enable the wider exploration of how a particular technology can be applied in other sector and industries. This not only could lead to one technology going on to 5 to 10 different commercial applications but also ‘potentially be a unique strength of UK innovation in the future.’

Challenges – Technology Readiness Levels (TRLs)

Linked to the commercialisation challenge, contributors recognised the strength of the UK in TRLs 1 to 3; though, as one said ‘there is a requirement for further understanding, support and investment to scale up and pull through to TRL 4 to 6.’ This point has been echoed by other contributors who noted a ‘gap between TRL 6 to 9. Specifically, for production scale-up, product qualification and demonstration of higher volume production economics.’

To address this challenge, contributors indicated the need for ‘a complete pipeline through the TRLs to enable manufacturers to access materials and technology that is mature enough to be implemented into industry without significant risks.’ Another contributor put forward a similar point, emphasising that ‘continued support for low-TRL research is crucial along with support for mid-TRL innovation that allows new materials to proceed from basic research to device trials to prototype demonstrations.’

Challenges – UK skills base

Finally, others raised another challenge: the vitality UK Advanced Materials skills base. They noted that experienced leaders are retiring and there is a need to upskill the community to meet the opportunities. Other contributors noted that ‘as the Advanced Materials sector scales, there will be increased demand for these skills and new high-tech roles can be established across the UK.’

Are there any specific gaps in UK Advanced Materials capability?

A recurring theme from contributors was that we must ‘learn from past mistakes – and in particular (for the materials supply chain) look outside the usual international benchmark comparators from US, Germany and Japan for best practice. We need to resist ‘the temptation to fund the latest high technology material invention at the expense of creating an entrepreneurial ecosystem. [….] best to seed winners but let them flow into a supportive eco-system, resist overfunding blue sky (winner picking) programmes’. Others commented ‘all opportunities should be assessed against whether UK has true capacity and capability to exploit or use new technology.’

Many also responded on the following points ‘Require national strategy; strategic gap in the UK’s translational research and commercialisation capacity to support the development and deployment of sustainable materials at the scale required to effectively address many of the challenges and opportunities highlighted in this response - funding to develop ecosystems and industry access.’

Strategy and leadership

Many contributors spoke of the requirement to develop strong leadership and a UK strategy. A contributor cited the ‘NAO report case study into Advanced Materials R&D funding identified a lack of national leadership across the area and suggested coherent leadership is needed ‘to tackle the barriers to collaboration, identify opportunities and challenges, develop a coherent investment strategy and maximise the value of government’s investment in research.’ Further, a House of Commons Public Accounts Committee enquiry considered coordination and leadership arrangements for Advanced Materials across government and noted a lack of research leadership in Advanced Materials, which would require additional support for leading individuals with new ideas alongside increasing levels of funding.

One contributor said ‘the UK has a key opportunity to be a global leader as part of its science superpower mission, but it needs to have a distinctive approach to the global agenda of materials innovation. A national strategy bringing together the UK centres of excellence in advanced material would help the UK to achieve this.’

Others said that by developing a strategy there was ‘an opportunity for the UK to gain advantage is to create stronger coordination between the different HM government funding programmes where Advanced Materials feature through a cross-sector strategy. This strategy, with industry stakeholder input for the commercialisation of Advanced Materials, would bring coherence to Advanced Materials funding across TRLs 1 to 7, enabling existing funding to gain coherence for industry, reduce possible duplication in support activities and understand emerging gaps in this fast-evolving area.’

Another contributor added that ‘The Royce Institute is but one aspect of materials investment. A UK landscape capability map would be informative in terms of the potential for place-based investment, connectivity and cluster development.’

Collectively, many contributors recommended the development of a national Advanced Materials Strategy. ‘There is a clear need to develop UK R&D, manufacturing capability and supply chains regarding advanced and sustainable polymer materials systems, to support and grow the UK manufacturing base for advanced composite materials, and metamaterials. In particular, the Strategy needs to address how to provide stability to local supply chains – from R&D to product development.’

Commercialisation

As the challenge section states, one of the weaknesses of the UK Advanced Materials area is around commercialising and its aspects, such as scaling up. In addition to the points noted previously, contributors noted that the scale up gap has led to the UK missing opportunities in developing ‘a new manufacturing sector by failing to deliver funding to develop scale quickly and not engaging UK industrial partners.’ For example, in lithium-ion batteries.

This gap has, in part, been put down to the lack of a ‘unifying strand to target Advanced Materials development, training, scale-up facilities, metrology or technology translation.’

Other contributors have noted that to help resolve this gap, there is a need for ‘incentives to encourage industry-academic links that could bridge the gap between research at TRL 3 to 6’ and ‘make R&D capability from small to pre-production scale.’

A contributor has gone on to emphasise that UK, whilst having enormous capabilities around basic science, ‘faces long-standing and structural challenges in translating this basic science research into commercialised projects and realising the economic value that could result from UK science’. A particularly challenging area within this is that of ‘the intervention rate for public funding and input into demonstrator projects.’ A contributor noted that ‘many countries in Europe provide far more generous intervention rates’ with risk being that if such a structural difference continues ‘the gulf between the UK and competitor countries is only likely to widen in the years to come.’

Finally, another contributor highlighted discussions with a significant number of companies from the Advanced Materials area shows that ‘they require the availability of laboratory and pilot scale facilities to help develop and commercialise new products and processes and so reduce the commercial risk to their main business.’ Currently, ‘there are insufficient pilot line facilities available to provide this service.’

Net Zero

Contributors noted that there was a gap with ‘the upstream capacity to take raw materials to a component level in mass markets. Copper recycling. Magnet recycling. Carbon fibre recycling. Glass fibre Re-enforced Plastic (GRP) recycling.’ And another commented ‘full-life materials systems design encompassing life cycle assessment, materials circularity and sustainability’ are required.’

Another proposed that ‘much of the UK manufacturing involves component assembly, but in certain sectors, component manufacture is not carried out so there is a lack of need in some sectors for some raw materials. E.g., at present, the UK assembles cells into battery packs but does not manufacture electrodes or cells, so recovering electrode material cannot be directly used in the UK. This is changing in this specific case, but it is true for other devices such as wind turbines and solar panels […].’

Further, others said: ‘the Circular Economy approach in the UK will examine the re-use of secondary materials in upcycling, which is not a focus elsewhere globally at present. This could provide higher value to certain key sectors, such as reuse of waste materials (not currently being recycled) in other applications (e.g., fibre glass). Connectors and adhesives are usually a rate and cost limiting challenge in disassembly. The UK could develop itself into a World leader in Responsible Innovation by incorporating disassembly strategies into product design. A contributor posited that there was a wider scale approach that should be taken via a full-life materials systems design encompassing life cycle assessment, materials circularity and sustainability.’

Similarly, from another contributor ‘there is a clear value for industrial application in developing lightweight, multi-material solutions within manufacturing, and considering the role of Advanced Materials to reduce energy use, increase product life and functionality, and support reuse and recycling to ensure sustainability across the whole product lifecycle and complete supply chain. Greater linkages within supply chains would make developing circular options and effective recycling more viable. This would allow those managing the re-use and dismantling processes to be more heavily involved in initial product development, of particular importance when materials which cannot be co-recycled have been joined together.’

Whilst from another contributor proposed ‘a National Programme for the End of Life of Advanced Materials. Future Advanced Materials need to be designed and developed, with a view of their recycling and disposal from the onset. It is critical to consider the development of a comprehensive programme about the decarbonisation and scale up of emerging recycling technologies for Advanced Materials, with a focus on proving the feasibility for investment at pilot/demonstrator scale. The programme should include the development and scale up of technology systems for multi-material sorting and separation, as well as the deployment at local level of pilot plants and scaled technologies, to use existing asset and waste management infrastructure.’

Others said ‘a promising aspect of animate materials specifically is that their ability to self-regulate and self-heal could make them more durable and less in need of replacement. However, such abilities will not by default make animate materials better for the environment than existing materials. Sustainability and circularity considerations must be taken into account at the earliest research and design stages. This is also true for the broader field of Advanced Materials.’

Some contributors said ‘to build in sustainability and circularity from the outset, there is scope for creating a supportive ‘outer ring’ of environmental scientists, sociologists, policy experts, ethicists, economists, lawyers and other businesses to collaborate with the scientists in applying and commercialising animate materials. Ideally, animate materials might be manufactured from resources already in circulation. In practice, this will require an economically viable recycling chain of key resources, from the point of waste collection to the sale and dissemination of recycled materials. Particularly relevant to BEIS and UKRI, funding bodies and can incentivise the inclusion of sustainability measures by building them into funding applications or evaluations. Good policy here would drive design for improved resource productivity that might otherwise be neglected and would be more difficult to introduce once manufacturing processes are already in place. At the most effective level it would also improve the UK’s critical material security and help to decouple UK markets from constrained supply chains.’

Another proposed ‘recycled or reclaimed Advanced Materials can be valorised to perform equal to or better than virgin. Green laws need to aid this rather than allowing the ‘its cheaper to create waste and send it to landfill’ mentality to continue. The UK could lead globally in this area with the right visionary Advanced Materials strategy leadership.’

Funding gap

Many contributors cited that ‘there is a significant gap in support and enabling environment for both UK based supply chains and late-stage development and demonstration activities including both financial and non-financial support.’

Another expanded this more comprehensively to:

• the UK lacks a UK international major (flagship) company in Advanced Materials
• the UK Advanced Materials companies are unable to develop past mid-cap without being taken into foreign ownership
• there are numerous supply chains within Advanced Materials and without comprehensive supply-chain surveys we lack the gap analyses to make effective interventions

It is, important that the UK:

• supports those islands of expertise where they can feed growing or big markets (such as composites materials)
• work on the ecosystem to ensure it is SME and entrepreneur friendly, easy to raise finance and get materials innovations to market: mechanisms for technology translation and managing the 2 valleys of death – a gap in UK funding landscape is the lack of a bridge between University invention and RTO innovation, meaning TRL3 to 4 space has a funding gap (not eligible for UKRI, Innovate, and not attractive to investors)’
• other contributors expressed that ‘UK research grants target technologies to TRL6 in the main’. Whilst another said ‘the major gap existing is the step of going from idea to commercial product, with high commercial potential. Universities large funding skew the assessment of those potential innovation and technologies, with a low success rate after 5 to 10 years’

Whilst another warned ‘technical maturity risk and challenge has transitioned into supply capacity risks and the potential that early emission reduction opportunities cannot be achieved through lack of UK risk venture capital.’ And on a similar theme, another said ‘corporate investors will invest in the industrialisation of new technology which can support their products, only if they have no option. In some cases, this technology will be taken to other parts of the world where industrialisation is supported closer to TRL 9.’

A recurring comment was ‘Patient capital is required to mature technology from TRL 6 to TRL 9 (product use). However, UK private investment targets 3-to-5-year investment, horizons which have low capital requirements. In many cases, investors will recommend licencing technology to maximise profits and minimise risks and costs.’ And another said ‘investment mechanisms designed to support early stage growth are generally too small in terms of value or too expensive.’

Similarly, contributors argued ‘this remains a significant concern and an area where further strategic intervention is needed if we are to address some of the key barriers to early adoption of materials (e.g. regulation). Approaches in this area need long-term thinking as businesses access to more patient, long-sighted investment capital has been identified as a requirement through the governments Patient Capital Review and is often cited as a challenge by small business leaders. Utilising existing investments and mechanisms we hope to address this area further in future through approaches such as an Industry pioneers scheme and providing Application scientists who can work more flexibly with industrial collaborators.’

Contributors proposed ‘creating a culture of incubation and entrepreneurship while having strong assessment and review along the way would benefit UK Advance Materials to the advancement that were made in the 70-90s, which still exists today.’

Whilst another said ‘A UK version of the ERDF scheme. The ERDF scheme has delivered key infrastructure in Manchester, including the National Graphene Institute, Graphene Engineering and Innovation Centre and the Sustainability Materials Innovation Hub within the Royce. However, this funding also comes with restrictions that can potentially limit its impact. A more open UK version of this funding scheme is highly desirable.’

Approaching the gap from another perspective, contributors suggested ‘improved enterprise training and support for early career researchers (ECRs), including training through CDTs and professional development. We have also found through the Eli and Britt Harari Enterprise Award at Manchester, that a moderate amount of seed funding (£50k) for ECRs can lead to success start-ups and spin outs.’

Carbon fibre

There were several contributions focused on carbon fibre supply concerns.

One contributor noted a reliance upon imports. They said the UK has ‘considerable composites industry in the UK worth some £5 billion with a potential to grow to nearly £13 billion by 2030 … around 60% of that growth is based on imported carbon fibre’. They went on to highlight existing plants export pretty much all it makes and that the UK no longer has ‘PAN precursor production capabilities’ since the site, has shut down. The result of this is that if ‘we don’t do something about a UK owned and based production capability we will be reliant on foreign based production, which by its very nature is not secure.’

One contributor said that ‘the UK has no domestic facilities for development or production of carbon fibres or their precursors’. More broadly a contributor has remarked that ‘it is impossible to source a fully UK manufactured resin or technical fibre for the composite industry’ and that ‘a sustainable (both ecologically and economically) chemical and textile production facility is urgently required to reduce exposure to supply chain fragility and protect competitivity and the global market.’

Another contributor has echoed this sentiment highlighting that the ‘UK suffers in particular from a lack of constituent material producers (in particular carbon fibre).’ This poses a gap in current capability with the ‘global requirement for carbon fibre is predicted to out-strip global capacity by 2025’ as such the UK stands the risk of ‘having blade factories standing idle due to an inability to source the carbon fibre needed which puts the headline requirement to achieve 40GW of offshore wind by 2030 at real risk.’

Also, a contributor promoted the need for ‘development of UK-based carbon fibre manufacture, using new lower energy processes and developing new precursor materials.’

Standardisation

Contributors highlighted the important role standardisation has to play in driving commercial success of Advanced Materials. They noted that ‘as these materials enter the marketplace, the [current] lack of standardisation contributes to customer confusion and could delay the large-scale adoption of UK-developed materials.’ They have gone on to describe the important purpose that standardisation serves: ‘it gives all customers an understanding of how materials are defined, allowing them to evaluate suppliers on a like-for-like basis.’ They also aid in ‘ensuring batch-to-batch consistency in materials, which is critical for integrating Advanced Materials in industrial applications’ and finally that it ‘allows international customers to understand and have confidence in the British products entering the market.’

Example: due to the current gap in standardisation companies have sought to capitalise on the popularity of Advanced Materials like graphene. Said products ‘may contain no graphene at all. It is important to the ongoing success of the UK graphene sector that only genuine graphene products can be labelled as such – standardisation will facilitate this process.’

Other contributors said that ‘there is currently a lack of reference materials and validated methods for the physicochemical characterisation of Advanced Materials and smart materials to support their safe and efficacious production which needs to be addressed.’

Another called for improvements that ‘could be made to enhance national facilities for standardisation of test methods (for data generation) and equipment calibration to support industry in terms of data for process simulations and engineering design.’ Praise was given to The National Physical Laboratory ‘for material thermal, physical and electrical testing but many capability gaps exist, particularly at high temperatures.’

Finally, a contributor has gone on to suggest the need to ‘accelerate the standardisation and publication of technical documentation, in the form of guides, specifications, and standards, through a 10-year roadmap that addresses the identified gaps in the regulations, codes and standards (RCS) infrastructure.

Verification and characterisation

Contributors posed that to meet net zero ambitions there were significant gaps in the UK capability. For example ‘with growing interest in zero-emissions and hydrogen economy there is a distinct lack of mechanical characterisation of advanced storage and structures materials at the pressures and temperatures associated with hydrogen storage like the long-term mechanical properties of carbon fibre reinforced composites at liquid H2 temperatures (20K). Tackling scale (form materials to structures) and coherent materials modelling at a range of scales – from hydrogen atoms to storage systems – is necessary and lacking.’

Whereas another contributor said we need ‘an integrated/agile materials R&D structure from discovery to implementation:

• incentives to encourage industry-academic links that could bridge the gap between research at TRL 3 to 6
• joined-up ‘make’ R&D capability from small to pre-production scale
• the verification/validation capability/certification for new materials to de-risk investment
• facilities for pre-clinical to clinal take-up of biomedical materials technologies’

Using the example of other countries that we could learn from, another contributor proposed ‘the establishment of a nationally distributed (hub and spoke) centre for materials assurance and verification – similar to the world leading centres in Germany (BAM), Japan (AIST) and the US (NREL) would fill a gap in the commercialisation landscape for Advanced Materials and bridge the mid-TRL ‘valley of death’ for innovation.

A dedicated UK centre for materials verification and assurance would bring scientists, application developers and engineers developing new materials and applications together with experts in metrology and provide access to emerging measurement knowledge and capabilities. This would fast-track future measurement protocols and standards that can accurately and reliably assess materials performance. The development of improved assurance and verification protocols and procedures would enhance the efficiency of materials development and lead to less wastage, achieving environmental sustainability. Without verification of new materials through independent and reproducible protocols, commercial pressures result in measurements that favour particular materials or products.’

Digitalisation and data

The contributions in this area spanned a wide range. One contribution stated ‘although many Advanced Materials companies are interested in transforming their research, innovation and product development activities by implementing digital techniques, they want to avoid wasting time and money, and implement the things that will have the biggest impact. We also heard from companies who have engaged with very large IT vendors who claim that they can digitise R&D. In fact, these organisations seem to have little or no meaningful insight into the real challenges faced by R&D organisations in the Advanced Materials sector.’

On a broader scale a contributor said, ‘the UK is a laggard when it comes to the investment in and adoption benefits of ‘a dedicated UK centre for automated manufacturing processes, robotics, data science and AI.’ Whilst another argued ‘to improve Advanced Materials and make them safer, it will be crucial to develop clear ways to diagnose what caused the material to behave in an unexpected desirable or undesirable way.’ Mechanisms that allow us to understand why Advanced Materials verification and assurance ‘behave in a particular way are analogous to ongoing developments in explainable AI, which seeks to build understanding in how or why an AI-enabled system led to a specific output. This is not just a safety measure; transparency of behaviour might be needed for users to develop trust in the material.’

Of the key gaps to be addressed, contributors spoke of:

• modelling could ‘fast-track future measurement protocols and standards that can accurately and reliably assess simulation of materials for materials and process optimisation
• materials informatics and its connection to high-throughput materials systems innovation (not just data curation but exploitation) to enable ‘materials for low energy computing, data storage and transmission’
• another suggested ‘establish an Advanced Materials assurance centre, to bring together the materials supply chain and regulators and deliver a central resource for providing access to trusted materials data’

Skills

Contributors have noted a gap in the pipeline for relevant talent and skills in Advanced Materials. ‘The main challenge in the UK for Advanced Materials is in maintaining a critical mass of skills in the discipline’. Others pointed to the ‘2020 Future of Jobs report’ and that ‘55% of companies surveyed reported that perceived skills gaps in the local labour market were a barrier to adoption of new technologies.’

Contributors said that the education chain is particularly hampered by a small number of universities provide degrees in materials science and engineering, with retainment in the sector also being low. Specifically, one contributor said that, within engineering, ‘there is a trend for talented individuals to seek more lucrative careers in other areas – such as finance.’

Carrying through into the workplace, materials selection and choice is hampered by a lack of advanced knowledge on the available materials, and what can be done with materials. This, some state, leads to a severe weakness in the knowledge chain for Advanced Materials across the UK engineering sector.

One contributor said, ‘that we need to have a strong pipeline of talented materials engineers that can meet the needs of UK businesses.’ They go on to highlight that ‘experienced materials engineers in the UK are difficult to obtain as there does not seem to be an abundance of available talent.’ This has been put down to ‘a reliance in the UK on EU talent; however, a lot of this has dried up due to Brexit.’

Another contributor noted that the composites engineering sector is, globally, facing an issue here; ‘meaning UK companies cannot solve the problem simply by looking overseas’. This development has been put down to ‘reluctance by companies to spend time and money on training’ coupled with ‘a lack of composite-specific information in courses.’

Whilst the UK materials science and engineering skills base is of high quality, there are significant diversity issues. One contributor noted that women and people from ethnic minority backgrounds are particularly underrepresented.

Contributors also said that a skills shortage for materials science and engineering already exists in the UK as a result of an imbalance between the supply and demand for talent. Other contributors put forward similar points noting the ‘strong demand for a structured programme of training (both practical and theoretical) for the early career researchers / PhD students’, as well as how it is ‘essential to invest in a skills pipeline to develop students who have equal confidence in synthesis, modelling, characterisation, metrology and testing.’ One contributor emphasises that there is also a need for ‘engineering skills: not simply academic ones.’

More specifically, a contributor noted how the ‘UK skills base in structural metallic and ceramic materials is dangerously eroded’ and requires ‘strategy and central co-ordination around bigger facilities such as for testing of electrical machines.’ Other possible solutions in addressing this gap from contributors include increases to ‘numbers of undergraduate and postgraduate students in materials by increasing the visibility of materials as a discipline with pre-university student bodies (schools and colleges)’, this would include STEM subjects. Other said ‘a focused fellowship approach, connected to our existing infrastructure, capitalising on flagship investments such as the Royce institute to attract a diverse group of the brightest emerging researchers and technical minds from around the world and tempt them to come and work in the UK.’

Finally, a contributor highlighted that ‘addressing the many scientific challenges of scaled materials fabrication and integration should be given more recognition and resources at university level,’ as this will facilitate better connections to UK institutions at higher TRL level and drive commercialisation.’

What lessons, if any, from other countries and companies could we learn from?

Introduction

Contributors wrote that ‘materials has a higher standing in other countries than the UK and in contrast with countries such as China, Japan, certain countries in the EU and the USA’. The UK does not have a National Advanced Materials strategy. Contributors said that ‘there is a public lack of understanding in the UK of what Advanced Materials are and how they affect the UK economy and ultimately the quality of life in the UK.’

Most contributors who answered this question proposed that the UK could learn from the US and Germany.

United States

Many contributors pointed out that ‘US national labs in the US attract significant amounts of funding (government and industry) to conduct and commercialise materials and materials manufacturing technologies; effective ways for tech transfer and adopting an integrated approach to create seamless innovation pathways for taking discoveries to markets.’

This ‘has been achieved and clearly demonstrated in large companies as well as Research & Innovation centres in Germany and US. US has been exceptionally effective at stimulating innovation with its tax dollars despite the popular narrative of the US being ‘hands-off’ capitalism’

Contributors also cited that ‘The US has significant investments the Department of Energy Quantum programme and Gordon Moore Foundation; Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) and is engaged in the global race to catch up with other countries. Contributors cited USA capability ‘Argonne National Labs ReCell Centre, LLNL, ORNL, Sandia. National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), USA: Employs ~2200 staff. Their labs allow new energy technologies to be investigated and further advanced in collaboration with both universities, businesses, and the metrology community.’

Regarding the differing funding models ‘In the USA, the National Science Foundation (NSF) runs a small business seed fund, with notable successes including Qualcomm and Symantec. NSF also supports much longer programmes with the average duration for 2021 being nearly 3 years, whereas in the UK this is often the upper limit. They ‘encourage proposers to request funding for durations of 3 to 5 years when such durations are necessary for completion of the proposed work and are technically and managerially advantageous’, and also offer 2-year extensions for ‘Special Creativity’ to tackle adventurous, riskier research related to but not covered by the original grant.’

Others noted that ‘in countries such as US and China, there is more support throughout the chain, such as loan guarantees to companies developing later stage technology demonstration and scale up, reducing the associated risks and helping to attract private investment.’

A contributor from the meta materials community said: ‘US Duke University takes the approach for example an idea for metamaterial exploitation was highlighted by academics with their technology transfer office. This idea was then floated to industry experts and business leaders who have vested interests in commercialising such technology.’

Regarding the strategic importance of materials, contributors added that ‘the US operates an intervention approach through Title III technology funds which ensures strategic technology suppliers receive sufficient funding to maintain a minimum capacity against a time when the defence sector needs to source the materials or technology. We are aware this is the subject of a separate strategy for Critical Minerals; however, it should be recognised that not all raw materials needed are minerals.’

And that: ‘on March 8th, 2022, the Biden Administration outlined its ‘strategy to revitalise and fortify U.S. Manufacturing supply chains, to also bolster clean energy manufacturing where Advanced Materials are of essence’. New reports written at the direction of President Biden review supply-chain vulnerabilities in semiconductors, high-capacity batteries, critical minerals and materials, and pharmaceuticals.’ They stress that support for innovation should be coupled strongly to domestic manufacturing incentives in order to bolster US industry.

Often cited is The Materials Genome Initiative in the US. It is a large multi-agency programme started in 2011 to accelerate the discovery, design, and deployment of new materials by combining data and computational tools with experiments. Its first goals were ambitious, covering all areas of materials and modelling, and allowed the country to develop methods and tools that are having clear impact in reducing costs and development time for new materials. A similar initiative with a more focused approach, where the same concept is applied to specific materials or applications of interest, could prove very valuable and would provide the basis upon which the methodologies could later be expanded to other areas.

One example of ‘a more focused approach in the US is the National Centre for Advanced Materials Performance (NCAMP). Using the curated NCAMP database, manufacturers that wish to utilise composite materials can prove equivalency and gain certification of their products quickly and at much lower cost than through a traditional material qualification approach.’

A note of caution from a contributor on both of these initiatives – Quality: ‘it is very difficult to establish the quality of the overall material property dataset (it depends on how the material was processed, which method was used to characterise, conditions during the test, etc). Currently, there is no agreed procedure on a ‘quality pedigree’ parameter for materials data recorded in a database. Therefore, there is a risk of creating an ‘internet of materials’, where it is very difficult to identify good quality from poor quality information. Business case: these are expensive to maintain, difficult to find a business model and time consuming.’

Germany

Across the call for evidence responses, contributors said Germany ‘has ambition to deliver materials and manufacturing technology of value to the German economy and has the infrastructure and requirements in place to do so.’

More successful approaches have focused on establishing mid-TRL level research centres to help translate research from academia to industry for example following the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft approach in Germany. The Fraunhofer Institutes are supported by a wider the ecosystem of institutes, which also include national centres on low TRL research (Max Planck Institutes), plus a large Materials Metrology activity both via a dedicated centre (BAM) and as part of the National Metrology Institute (PTB).

Another contributor added that ‘there is strong industrial alignment and engagement is delivered through national and regional funding mechanisms, in particular the Helmholtz and Fraunhofer networks which drive industrially relevant materials research.’

When considering industry activities, a contributor spoke of ‘the German model is a more integrated ecosystem between all parties of materials development and use, which could be argued to lead to more effective identification and adoption of new and novel materials, and a stronger supply infrastructure. This latter point is of particular note, and clearly of value to German industry. One example of this is BMW, a Bavarian car manufacturer, who when instigating a new plant in South Carolina took their supply chain with them, retaining their existing supplier relationships but creating local jobs by communicating a long-term vision and commitment. The plant now boasts 11,000 direct jobs and 40 Tier 1 suppliers attracted to the state.’

Another contributor added ‘in valuing materials, greater importance is placed on end-of-life management and keeping materials within the economy rather than exporting.’

Asia

Asia was also frequently cited as an area to learn from.

China is also often cited a country to learn from, with its focus on controlling the supply chain, using levers such as strong presentation at standards committees at ISO, and its focus on commercialisation of academic discovery. As a contributor explains: ‘China’s approach can provide a great insight into the strategic planning of manufacturing of materials and materials resourcing. With a changing world order it is important to be able to do a lot of material manufacturing effectively and efficiently in different settings than purely relying on outsourcing and that does require a high level of expertise.’

Other countries that were cited by contributors were ‘South Korea – the UK spend on R&D is just 1.8% GDP compared to 4.5% in South Korea; and, for example, South Korea’s 3 leading electric-vehicle (EV) battery companies, LG Chem Ltd, Samsung SDI Co. and SK Innovation Co. spent a combined $1 billion in R&D projects in the first half of 2020, up 8.8% from the same period in the previous year.’

Japan was also cited with the ‘development of lithium-ion battery technologies, developed in Oxford and commercialised in Japan. UK missed the opportunity to develop a new manufacturing sector by failing to deliver funding to develop scale quickly and not engaging UK industrial partners Japan has a more integrated system to enable transition from early research to volume production.’

Also cited was the ‘National Centre of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), Japan: Employs ~3000 staff Includes 5 departments developing goal-oriented research, one of which is the materials metrology institute for Japan, and 2 centres, which are temporary centres working with industrial partners in key national challenges.’

Contributors also spoke of Singapore ‘having a strong track-record in long-term thinking, with the government incentivising inward investment and re-location packages for industry, and government support to develop in-country facilities and jobs. This is then surrounded by an ecosystem of industrially focussed research facilities and geared research grants in universities. This is a good example of joined-up, long-term governmental, industrial and research funding policy designed for sustained national growth and development.’

Malaysia, ‘They have something in situ called the National Graphene Action Plan, which sits under the NanoMalaysia banner - a part of the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation, Malaysia doesn’t have a national graphene supply, yet they are pushing ahead with the support of commercialising products, which they will then sell globally.’

Another contributor added that Taiwan was of interest and that ‘countries in Asia have greater innovation funding agility which supports large companies in fast-moving sectors.’

EU and individual countries

As was the EU and individual countries.

Once contributor cited the European Union with its ‘Graphene Flagship Programme and its 10 year investment of patient funding; whereas another extensively spoke of the recent Advanced Materials 2030 Manifesto, presented to Mariya Gabriel, Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth also underlines the key role that Advanced Materials will play and calls for ‘A strong European Materials ecosystem [that] drives the green and digital transition as well as a sustainable inclusive European society through a systemic collaboration of upstream developers, downstream users and citizens and all stakeholders in between.’

The Manifesto further stresses the importance of blue-skies research on Advanced Materials in conjunction with end-user needs and recognises that ‘Blue sky research’ (i.e. research where ‘real-world’ applications are not immediately apparent) and applied research both play an integral part in this approach. It calls for ‘a systemic approach to develop the next generation solution-oriented Advanced Materials which will offer faster, scalable and efficient responses to the challenges and thus turn them into opportunities for Europe’s society, economy and environment today and in the future…’

Several contributors mentioned France, where there is long term support to the supply chain and academic community with industrially relevant research support and significant support to major research institutions and facilities. The French Space agency CNES. CNES also take a much more hands on role when it comes to looking at future materials developments, they seem to have inputs into PhD studies and are much closer linked to academia and the primes. SPINTEC (SPINtronique et TEchnologie des Composants) is one of the leading spintronics research laboratories worldwide.’

They cite that France has created a functioning example of an integrated R&D hub covering every aspect of the supply chain of biobased Advanced Materials, their production via agricultural techniques and interface with industrial and local societal actors/communities to facilitate the development. The IAR Pole is the catalyst for the Bioeconomy For Change (B4C), with 500 partners, €2.5bn and 350+ projects funded. B4C has a structure not dissimilar to ATI in terms of membership, however it is significantly broader (with local communities, councils and charities/organisations also included, as a part of the integral IP/product chain generation).’

Another contributor added ‘it is also important to consider the lifecycle of a material. Few years ago, some companies in France started to refuse accepting TiO2 waste due to a lack of guidance and standards on waste management and safe disposal of nanomaterials.’

A number of contributors cited Netherlands: example of an integrated materials strategy - the Materials Institute (M2I) and the Dutch polymer institute (DPI) basically operate as ‘brokers’ to create common programmes spanning a range of industries (for instance Tata and SKF working together). These organisations do not own equipment and have no researchers, but they do have some implementation engineers. The whole materials community is gathered in MaterialenNl, the steering group of this platform coordinates roadmaps and they initiate large proposals or initiatives like NanonextNl, Duurzame Materialen NL.

In the Netherlands the Veni, Vidi, Vici programme provides the opportunity for early career grants that are assessed and awarded in separate pools, developing early careers and the talent pipeline.

Contributors also noted Belgium: ‘in terms of horizon scanning one upcoming area relates to ‘information materials’ and the potential to improve this in terms of precision synthesis. Belgium have particular strengths in this for information storage.’

And another contributor cited ‘Ireland with the The Irish Photonic Integration Centre (IPIC), sponsored by Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) Centre, is Ireland’s centre of excellence for research, innovation and PhD training in photonics and AMBER, the SFI Research Centre for Advanced Materials and BioEngineering Research is a dynamic, multidisciplinary partnership between world-leading material scientists, bioengineers and industry. AMBER works collaboratively to address fundamental research questions and create solutions with impact for society in ICT, MedTech, energy and sustainable industrial technologies. AMBER is hosted by Trinity College Dublin in partnership with CRANN (Centre for Research on Adaptive Nanostructures and Nanodevices).’

Companies

An effective summary from one contributor commented ‘from an industrial perspective, a lot can be learned from some of the most profitable companies in the public and private sectors such as Tesla and SpaceX. Both of these companies started with different missions but realized the importance of Advanced Materials in their journeys. Even though their Advanced Materials products are not as widely advertised or celebrated, they have provided the world with amazing innovations across many different areas.’

Whilst another commented on commercial space travel ‘there has been an incredible investment in the commercial space sector, with a willingness to challenge the established norms (for example on technology costs), and an eagerness to make programmes leaner (particularly with the legacy of government funding ‘bloat’ (as observed in NASA)). SpaceX, for example, offers several important lessons that could benefit UK advanced material development:

• rapid development of new steels (for cryogenic conditions)
• qualification and use of friction stir welding for aluminium casing components
• streamlining production lines favouring in-house build (with a reduced dependence on international supply chains, which were inflexible to the demands of the programme and unpredictable due to external factors)’

The UK vaccine roll out

The vaccine rollout was remarked up on by several contributors: ‘a good example of what can be done with the correct political will and resources to rapidly scale up and deliver a novel complex ‘material’ (the vaccine). Key characteristics:

• prioritised and well-resourced: government-led task force with public money
• multiple players: academics, government facilities and private companies, all encouraged to work together
• intelligent customer: offering fast and effective release of funds (for example, no long grant processes), fully informed of status
• parallel approach: initiating scale-up facilities even while the fundamental science was still being developed

While the vaccine programme was a unique case, some of these factors could be applied to the fast development and rollout of advanced nuclear materials.’

What are the strengths of UK Advanced Materials?

The UK has excellent research and development strengths in Advanced Materials

Many contributors highlighted the strength of our UK research and academic capabilities and history. As one contributor put it ‘the UK has world-leading, and Nobel Prize winning, academic capability with the discovery and early research of Advanced Materials.’

One contributor said that ‘the UK’s university base has long-standing strengths in material science, the invention and discovery of new materials and collaborating with industry. An international comparative analysis commissioned by BEIS found that the UK’s academic performance in Advanced Materials and nanotechnology was ranked second in the world on the basis of field-weighted citation impact, and seventh in the world based on the total volume of research articles published.’

Numerous contributors highlighted academic centres of strength across the UK. ‘There are many research centres (Exeter, Manchester, Nottingham, Leeds, Strathclyde, Sheffield, Cambridge, Imperial, Liverpool, Oxford, Cranfield), as well as the Henry Royce Institute.’ This also includes, as one contributor put it, the UK’s ‘wide ranging and established international collaboration network.’

There was praise for the establishment of the Henry Royce Institute: the UK’s national institute for Advanced Materials. A contributor said ‘The Henry Royce Institute has given a much stronger voice to the materials community in the UK and has started breaking down the some of the silos in the UK academic network.’

Further contributions said that ‘the UK is particularly strong in early research into 2D materials, Metamaterials, Composites and other Advanced Materials, there are also cross-cutting strengths in surface chemical analysis and surface engineering. Applications where the UK has strengths in the application of Advanced Materials include compound semiconductors, processable electronics (plastic, printed, and nano-electronics), aerospace materials, advanced composites, and defence and security.’

On a scale-up/translation basis, and linked to the more broader UK capability in materials science, a contributor said the UK has ‘strong commercial test and characterisation supply chain which is populated by both specialist SMEs and larger multinationals, supported by the National Physical Laboratory for niche testing. High Value Manufacturing Catapults and their associated university affiliations have been a success in bringing together materials and manufacturing expertise to bridge New Product Introduction.’

Further contributions highlighted the UK’s ‘mechanisms for delivery and mature industry-university collaborations’ as a strength and that there was a ‘compact, integrated community spanning industry/ academia/ catapults/ Institutes/ Research and Technology Organisations.’

Another contributor highlighted that ‘the Innovate UK funded Catapults offer the opportunity for industry to apply Advanced Materials, through test-bedding or process formulation to breakthrough products, processes, services, and technologies. Another important development centre for Advanced Materials is the Graphene Engineering Innovation Centre at the University of Manchester, which sits between academia and industry.’

Indeed, one contributor said ‘the solution of many of the substantive innovation challenges for the full breadth of Advanced Materials challenges is critically reliant on a deep and wide foundation of world leading academic science in the UK.’

Reflecting this strength, a contributor said ‘many examples of great achievements in the sector, not only well-established research ones, e.g. graphene, but also strengths of the materials modelling community, and further in sectors around the health and environmental impacts of materials, with centres in Universities (Edinburgh, Birmingham, Swansea, Plymouth), UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology and UK industry (Yordas, Haydale) to name but a few.’

A Contributor argued that individual materials actors can exploit their advantages in the UK. A contributor said ‘the engineering ceramic sector underpins and enables advancement in many other hi-tech industries in addition to aerospace – e.g., clean energy (fuel cells, batteries), automotive (brakes, sensors, parts) – defence/sovereign security– healthcare (dentistry, hip joints) – telecommunications & IT – advanced manufacture (casting, grinding, glass refractories). Ceramic materials, coatings and composites are already known to be key to delivering decarbonisation (net zero), electrification and hydrogen economy goals in each of these sectors.’

On a skills basis, a contributor also highlighted the UK’s ‘depth of capability and experienced resource in training next generation of researchers.’

The UK has successful and growing Advanced Materials companies

Large companies, like Rolls Royce, and sectors, like aerospace, use and harness UK Advanced Materials capabilities. On a company level, one contributor said: ‘there are a number of successful and growing UK mid-size companies which remain highly innovative and focused on sustainable growth in the field of Advanced Materials and systems – e.g., Renishaw, Morgan Advanced Materials, Ceres Power, etc. – who are prepared to invest and have the capability to continue to innovate and bring novel materials solutions to market.’

The UK has standards and regulation strengths in Advanced Materials

A contributor believes that the UK has a leading approach to standards and regulation. They believe that their area of interest in this domain can only succeed ‘with strong and long-lasting support from UK government.’ They expand to say: ‘this support is clearly evident from the bold commitment to the STEP (Spherical Tokamak for Energy Production) programme and the UK’s proportionate and pro-innovation approach to fusion regulations. By contrast, Europe is simply adopting restrictive fission frameworks, which is stifling innovation and slowing progress. When combined with novel approaches for materials assurance, the UK’s progressive approach to a regulatory framework, tailored to the actual safety landscape for fusion, will help the UK realise its goals of leading the world in the commercialisation of fusion energy.’

Another contribution, which was echoed, stated that at ‘the National Physical Laboratory, metrological research, within laboratories and in collaboration with industry, into Advanced Materials often leads to documentary standards, which are a key part of the innovation landscape.’

The National Physical Laboratory supplied this case study: ‘Development of metrology for Lambda Energy to accelerate investment in renewable energy’.

‘Lambda Energy Ltd, based in Cambridge, is developing a spectral conversion coating for application onto new build and retrofit solar PV panels, which increases electrical output by up to 10%. In previous tests the test rig was giving off a number of errors and therefore Lambda needed NPL and the Measurement for Recovery (M4R) programme to help reduce the error and address the source of variability.

It is critically important that Lambda Energy can measure the performance of its prototype coatings with a high degree of confidence so that they can optimise the prototype design and reassure potential investors and partners.

… NPL’s expertise has therefore been invaluable in helping to accelerate development and investment in renewable energy, aiding the green recovery and supporting the UK’s commitment to reaching Net Zero by 2050.’

Government has provided significant investment for Advanced Materials, which has encouraged private investment

Contributors highlighted that ‘the UK government has significantly invested in Advanced Materials via the Henry Royce Institute, High Value Manufacturing Catapult and other initiatives.’

More contributions said ‘across the UK, Advanced Materials companies … benefit from a range of financial support such as R&D tax credits and innovation loans, as well as R&D funding through Innovate UK and local funding opportunities.’

According to some contributors, this has helped, and is helping, to leverage private investment. ‘Some … companies are beginning to gain substantial private investment, e.g., [name], [name] and there have been other major joint ventures by more established chemical companies such as [name].

This scale-up of material production has, in turn, enabled companies further along the supply chain who require large quantities of Advanced Materials to innovate some application areas … such as Clean Growth. An example of this is the improvement of concrete, the most abundant man-made material on the planet, and one which contributes roughly 8% of CO2 emissions globally. UK-based Nationwide Engineering have developed ‘Concretene’, a concrete containing few-layer graphene particles produced by SME Versarien, in partnership with the Graphene Engineering Innovation Centre in Manchester. This new concrete material has improved properties that allow the construction company to use 30% less concrete and remove steel reinforcement. As well as leading to cost-savings, this innovation has the potential to significantly reduce carbon emissions, aiding in the achievement of the UK’s Net Zero targets.’

Also, other contributors said ‘Manufacturing Hubs investments made across the UK provide wider infrastructure needed to deliver Advanced Materials and bridge the gaps to commercial use. Regional investments such as the Compound Semi-conductors (CSC) Hub in South Wales exemplify the potential outcomes that we can deliver when focussed investment is made to both enable to translation of R&D and deliver against key challenges or in areas of strategic advantage.

Major facilities, such as the ISIS Neutron and Muon Source based at the at Rutherford Appleton Laboratory also offer considerable benefit to the UK Advanced Materials community both academic and industrial with multiple mechanisms available to obtain access to these internationally renowned facilities.’

Others reflected government backing in the talent pipeline. ‘The funding arrangement through Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, the Centres for Doctoral Training, and programme grants has been beneficial to allowing industry to progress novel ideas with relatively low business risk and to collaborate, maximising the return on investment.’