This collaborative, cross sector R&D demonstration project furthers previous industrial research to advance & showcase novel technology developed to support transformation of Foundation Industry production process optimisation. The primary aim is to increase efficiency to achieve greater productivity by increased energy and resource efficiency. This will be achieved by using advanced robotics integrated with 3D machine vision systems which are augmented with bespoke sensors creating a data rich environment. The robotic, vision and sensory technology will be applied and demonstrated with foundation industry production processes building on previous R&D to digitally inspect defects in metals, glass and ceramics. With additional utilisation of machine learning (ML) on data collected, the advacned artificial intelligence (AI) developed can begin to enhance these traditional Foundation Industry production processes to enabling greater industrial productivity whilst significantly reducing energy consumption and CO2 emissions in both glass, metals, and ceramic manufacturing. Current manufacturing methods are inflexible, often requiring the time-intensive pre-programming or manual intervention of production tasks responding to unexpected occurrences or production errors. This means that foundation industries are unable to respond to the demands of future environmental targets and cannot make further improvements within the manufacturing process until the production methods are updated. This is critical to address; success will allow UK manufacturing to remain competitive when facing increasing global competition where labour rates and emissions regulations are significantly lower. This project aims to use advanced 3D vision sensor data to produce ML and AI algorithms to monitor and improve the metals, glass and ceramic production process. To guarantee the repeatability and accuracy of measurement, automation through the flexibility offered by modern multi-axis robotic systems will be demonstrated. The ultimate output of the system will result in foundation industry-wide benefits in glass, ceramics, and metals production. This project will address specific needs in these foundation industries by offering an augmented, existing manufacturing process brought about by digitised inspection & intelligent machine learning. It is anticipated that a reduction in energy costs and improved production yields associated with the manufacture of tempered glass & kiln fired ceramic materials will be significantly and positively impacted, as is the case in the foundry castings industries.

This project will improve resource efficiency and symbiosis between UK foundation industries by utilising waste derived clay from the ceramics sector to produce high value innovative cement formulations. It will develop industrial connections and enhance UK supply chains by providing new low carbon resource efficient products for the UK construction industry. In doing so it will help to secure UK jobs and GVA. Clay is a raw material common to three of the UK foundation industries; cement, ceramics and paper. Higher-grade clays such as China clay are extracted for the manufacture of white ceramics and paper. Medium-grade clays are extracted to manufacture ceramics such as bricks and tiles, whereas lower-grade clays are extracted and utilised by the UK cement industry to produce Portland cement clinker. Waste derived clay material is generated during the extraction of higher-grade clays and through production and use of medium-grade clays (waste bricks/brick fines). In this project, waste derived clay from several different sources will be characterised and tested for the properties useful for cement and concrete production. Waste derived clays will be prepared using two different heating methods to enable comparisons of the resulting properties. These methods are a rotary kiln, a commonly available technology and 'flash heating', a new and innovative heating technique not yet trialled in the UK. The prepared material will be expertly formulated into cement compositions which will be tested for conformity to EU/UK standards. Concrete mixes using these clay cements will be developed and optimised with mix enhancing chemical admixtures. Both fresh and hardened properties will be examined to maximise the market potential of the new cements. The information from the testing and pilot work will be presented to the national standards body to modify the national concrete standards to remove a barrier to market for these new cements. Deployment of these new cements on the UK market could reduce waste by 1.4 million tonnes and reduce the embodied CO2 of cement by around 10-30% compared to the market leading CEM I cement.

Economic and industry forecasts indicate a prolonged impact from COVID-19 on the UK economy and more specifically the construction sector. The Construction Product Association forecast a 25% fall during 2020, with certain commentators predicting output in 2021 to be 20% lower than 2019\. Manufacturers and suppliers within the industry have been forced to restructure operations to reflect anticipated declines in the short and medium-term; with employee reductions and mothballing of facilities. Business survival strategies are being implemented at the same time the industry is challenged to reinvent to address strategic priorities of innovation and net zero carbon. This is illustrated no more vividly than within the precast concrete market. As Government seeks to expedite the procurement and construction of viable projects, COVID-19 has stimulated a turning point in the private sector's adoption of modern methods of construction. AMA research forecast that the precast concrete sector will grow by 18% to £2.3.bn by 2024, however the sectors ability to accelerate investment in decarbonisation is compromised. As a cement based product, traditional concrete manufacture is a fuel intensive, electro-intensive and CO2 intensive process, said to be responsible for 4-8% of the world's CO2\. An increased demand for products and market growth, stimulated as a result of COVID, could, without corresponding innovation, represent a threat to the clean growth strategy of the UK. Concrete is however a unique material in that the specifier has the ability to directly influence its constituent parts to ensure an optimum carbon footprint that meets performance criteria and addresses the design imperatives of resource and energy efficiency within a whole life context, that also address the precepts of a circular economy. Significant carbon savings can be realised through the design decisions of architects and engineers, in collaboration with precast manufacturers. Material efficient structure can be optimised to minimise carbon, however supply side barriers (e.g. availability and cost of raw materials) and demand side barriers (e.g. restrictions in concrete standards) currently limit their application and diffusion within the marketplace. Engaging key market actors within the value chain, this project plans to overcome these barriers, to deliver decarbonisation without compromising sector competitiveness. Benchmarked against the performance of an existing public sector portfolio, this project will accelerate the pathway towards net zero, through improved design, product selection and manufacturing and construction processes of precast concrete components.