CORE: Creative outreach for resource efficiency

Being more efficient with resources, i.e. water, energy, packaging, transport, raw materials and waste, benefits the environment through more effective use of finite assets and reductions in emissions; it can also collectively deliver savings for business and, at a national level, make UK industry more profitable. Recent UK government policy and strategy has created a step-change in support for resource efficiency (RE) initiatives, underlining the UK's commitment to development in this area. As a result, RE has become a headline term within UK government and business, stimulated by the EU flagship initiative on RE under the Europe 2020 strategy, which provides a long-term framework (roadmap) for action. However, with the UK's rate of recycling of municipal waste still ranked only 11th in Europe and growing pressure to address materials' scarcity, there is strong evidence that public engagement in RE needs to be increased further. Outreach to users and the general public as well as businesses is critical to the delivery of any national RE targets and aspirations. Yet there are many different 'publics', or stakeholders, because the subject domain is extremely broad, complex and highly multi-disciplinary. Despite the presence of support, guidance and frameworks for engaging non-academic parties in research, more needs to be done to excite people about the potential opportunities that can be gleaned from RE. So, this is a timely opportunity to explore the nexus of current policy direction on RE, delivery of needed, transformative research (through the EPSRC's Resource Efficiency area) and societal engagement. CORE (Creative outreach for resource efficiency) aims to support the delivery of a vibrant and creative outreach programme to maximise public and user engagement in RE. It is an enabler project, helping other EPSRC-supported projects (funded through the EPSRC's Resource Efficiency sandpit) to deliver high-impact, world-class science. Essentially, through-life, the CORE project will gain momentum and broaden its outreach by continually cycling through a three-stage process of capacity building (based on existing networks and contacts); disseminating key results to targeted audiences and getting feedback; and then, reaching out to new participants (academics and others), with a view to long-term survival and winning subsequent funded projects. The project will ideate, coordinate and support the use of vibrant and creative outreach mechanisms for exciting public and user engagement activities; organise specific events and activities; establish a new, one-stop online shop for information, dissemination and knowledge-sharing; support the targeted dissemination of high-quality outcomes; sustain and develop a healthy, collegiate community of practice; and, identify and communicate news of outreach, collaboration, enterprise and research opportunities. CORE will strive to be vibrant, visual and creative, ensuring that academics 'get out of the lab', provoke public debate and deliver world-class engagement on their projects. This project will directly support outward-facing activities of value with appropriate public and user groups through an Innovative Outreach Fund, cross-cutting themes and policymakers' events. Partner institutions will use exciting mechanisms (such as pop-up labs, crowdsourcing, podcasts, social design and innovation, physical hands-on and fun demonstrations and schools events) to encourage dialogue, co-create outcomes and deliver impact with a range of stakeholders. This project has strong links to the EPSRC's research themes of: 'Living with Environmental Change', 'Engineering' and 'Manufacturing the Future'. CORE responds to the national and European policy agendas on resource efficiency and so will place the UK in a leadership position on engagement, co-creation and, hopefully, partnership building in this emerging area.

The range of possible transformative outcomes on resource efficiency (RE) that could arise via CORE (both through its own endeavours and by funding the 'More with Less' EPSRC sandpit-funded projects, SFPs, to deliver outreach activities), relate to many aspects of public life, so it is vital to deploy our funding carefully to ensure societal and economic impacts are delivered for four key groups of beneficiaries (business, policymakers, education and civil society). First, business and industry (including designers, manufacturers, contractors, consultants, and SMEs), professional institutions (e.g. BSA; RSC; IMechE; IOM3; ICE; CIWEM; IEMA), their members, peer networks (ECI; CIRIA; Environmental Sustainability, Materials and Modern Built Environment KTNs). The scope of outreach here crosses many industries and professions, so the development of a stakeholder strategy (WP2b) will be vital to direct effort accordingly. UK industry will benefit from results that lead to greater RE, lower environmental impacts, less waste (therefore lower costs). There will be improved efficiency of operations from having access to new data and knowledge about how to reduce impacts, hence national competitiveness will be enhanced. Related professional bodies, peer networks and their members will benefit from having opportunities to input to research and gaining early access to research outcomes, informing their strategy and policy development. Policymakers (e.g. DEFRA, BIS, EA), near-government bodies (e.g. EPSRC, WRAP) and standards-making committees will be able to input to the direction of CORE and SFPs and gain early access to results through the Westminster Workshops (WP3b). Through CORE, policy-makers will benefit from UK science and engineering taking a leading role in innovation in knowledge development in RE and be informed by case studies of novel methods of increasing public engagement with science and engineering. Standards bodies will be more informed on the emergence of new technologies and approaches, such that suites of standards relating to RE can be updated. Education providers (i.e. schools and colleges and representative bodies such as HEA and STEM) will benefit from targeted outreach, improving pupil engagement with research and increasing aspiration levels. Sustainable development (within which RE nests) is introduced in the National Curriculum as a key concept in Geography in key stage 1, alongside knowledge and understanding of environmental change. The concept is continued at key stage 2, changing to environmental interaction and sustainable development for key stage 3. Sustainability and RE is also picked up in science at key stage 3 and 4, making it a core theme taught from 3 to 16 year olds and beyond. Schools teaching to a personal and social education framework whether it is 'Global citizenship' or 'connected learning thematic units' etc., also highlight sustainable development. This subject is regarded as an ideal vehicle for interdisciplinary learning and can bring relevance, depth, challenge and breadth to learning. Sustainability themes are therefore embedded within the curriculum, and within the life of the schools, but RE brings a new perspective by exploring difficult trade-offs. CORE will aim to deepen engagement and excite the public through novel, targeted outreach activities (e.g. WP3a), directed to community groups, product users and social enterprises. They will benefit from live, 'social innovation exchange' with researchers, hands-on experience of physical demonstrators and the opportunity to debate key issues (consumerism, waste, materials scarcity etc). Voluntary and charitable (i.e. third sector bodies and NGOs in this domain, such as; WWF; FoE; Forum for the Future; UK Green Building Council and WBCSD) will also be targeted to input to research direction; they will benefit from closer contact with major research consortia and a chance to challenge conventional science.