On Thursday I gave a talk at the Materials Congress (the talk is attached). The development of the Grantham offices meant that the talk was given in a large marquee. As the breeze picked up outside, it felt a little more like camping than a conference! Bernie had made me agree to review the UK perspective on the future of materials science. Giving this sort of presentation is not easy. You have to try to stand outside the world you usually inhabit and take a look at it objectively. The more I thought about it, the more I realised that I strongly believe that the Materials Innovation and Growth Team, and those who set up Materials UK 2 years ago got it right. The focus was necessary not just because of resource limitations but because they identified the critical aspects of our industry. The work on materials for energy probably doesn’t need to be justified these days, but when we started it wasn’t so obvious. The emphasis on sustainability – and the need for validated, quantitative data on which to base decisions about materials selection is similarly becoming an accepted fact. The work with the design community still needs proselytising – the link is hampered by different language and cultures, but the impact of MADE increases daily and more and more materials scientists and engineers are making the effort to understand – an effort most designers have made from the start.

One of the questions after the talk was about the competitive nature of UK materials science. We are good, but by working with the design community, I believe we can be world-class. The UK has the best industrial designers and architects in the world, our fashion competes with a few other countries for the top spot, and in most aspects of design we are up with the best. Most of these designers need to use materials to make their products. Add to that the increasing capability of the UK knowledge base to lead thinking and practice in the area of sustainability, and the fast growing environmental services sector in the UK and you have a winning combination.

☺

David

On Friday I had a meeting with two guys from BSi – also known as British Standards. They had run across the work of Materials UK in the arena of materials resource efficiency through this blog and were interested in our ideas on the Materials Property Validation Centre.

Standards are an important, and often forgotten weapon in the drive for innovation. Everett Rogers work on the Diffusion of Innovations, first published in 1963, divides those who take up innovation into several classes. Innovators themselves do not need much encouragement and comprise only a few percent of the population. The next group, and this is where Rogers introduced us all to the concept of “early adopters”, need only to be made aware of the existence of innovations to want to own or use them. They make up about 1/8 of the population. Next come the “early majority”. These are very influenced by standards and seek to take advantage of innovations when they think they are accepted by a broad cross-section of the population. They make up about 1/3 of the population. The next group, the “late majority” need the power of regulations and laws to drive them to look at new ways of doing things, but they do eventually succumb. Finally, the “laggards” are usually driven out of business by the regulations because they cannot adapt.

BSi had also identified the need for better standards in the area of materials specification – to add a validated measure of the environmental impact of a material, both before it is selected for a specific application and once it is selected, used and eventually needs to be disposed of or recycled. The meeting reached agreement on a path forward rapidly and we are now into the planning of the delivery!! Watch this space and keep your own standards up!! ☺

David