The UK food chain, comprising agricultural production, manufacturing, distribution, retail and consumption, involves more than 300,000 enterprises and employs 3.6 million people. The food and drink industry is the largest manufacturing sector, employing 500,000 people and contributing £80 billion to the economy. It is also estimated that the food chain is responsible for 160 MtCO2e emissions and 15 Mt of food waste, causing significant environmental impacts. Energy is an important input in all stages of the food chain and is responsible for 18% of the UK's final energy demand. In recent years, progress has been made in the reduction of energy consumption and emissions from the food chain primarily through the application of well proven technologies that could lead to quick return on investment. To make further progress, however, significant innovations will have to be made in approaches and technologies at all stages of the food chain, taking a holistic view of the chain and the interactions both within the chain and the external environment. The EPSRC Centre for Sustainable Energy Use in Food Chains will make significant contributions in this field. It will bring together multidisciplinary research groups of substantial complementary experience and internationally leading research track record from the Universities of Brunel, Manchester and Birmingham and a large number of key stakeholders to investigate and develop innovative approaches and technologies to effect substantial end use energy demand reductions. The Centre will engage both in cutting edge research into approaches and technologies that will have significant impacts in the future, leading towards the target of 80% reduction in CO2 emissions by 2050, but also into research that will have demonstrable impacts within the initial five year lifetime of the Centre. Taking a whole systems approach, the research themes will involve: i) Simulation of energy and resource flows in the food chain, from farm-gate to plate to enable investigations of energy and resource flows between the stages of the chain and the external environment, and facilitate overall energy and resource use optimisation taking into consideration the impact of policy decisions, future food and energy prices and food consumption trends. ii) Investigation of approaches and technologies for the reduction of energy use at all stages of the chain through reduction of the energy intensity of individual processes and optimisation of resource use. It is expected that a number of new innovative and more efficient technologies and approaches for energy reduction will be developed in the lifetime of the Centre to address processing, distribution, retail and final consumption in the home and the service sector. iii) Identification of optimal ways of interaction between the food chain and the UK energy supply system to help manage varying demand and supply through distributed power generation and demand-response services to the grid. iv) Study of consumer behaviour and the impact of key influencing factors such as changing demographics, increased awareness of the needs and requirements of sustainable living, economic factors and consumption trends on the nature and structure of the food chain and energy use. Even though the focus will be on the food chain, many of the approaches and technologies developed will also be applicable to other sectors of the economy such as industry, commercial and industrial buildings and transportation of goods. The Centre will involve extensive collaboration with the user community, manufacturers of technology, Government Departments, Food Associations and other relevant research groups and networks. A key vehicle for dissemination and impact will be a Food Energy and Resource Network which will organise regular meetings and annual international conferences to disseminate the scientific outputs and engage the national and international research and user communities

By 2050 it is estimated that the global population will exceed 9 billion. This is expected to result in a 100% increase in demand for food. The world needs more high-quality protein, produced in a responsible manner. This challenge is addressed by UN Sustainable Development Goals SDG2 (Zero hunger) and SDG12 (Responsible Consumption and Production). Expansion of marine fish aquaculture has been highlighted as a key route to increase food production. It is also an important area for the blue economy with high potential for new jobs and revenue. In the UK, marine aquaculture is worth over £2 billion to the economy, supports 2300 jobs and has ambitions to double production by 2030. But climate change is a threat as fish production is highly sensitive to the environment. Climate change assessments are often only available for large areas, e.g. global or regional, and do not capture the local conditions that influence fish production. They focus on long-term decadal averages which miss the daily environmental variability and multiple stressors that fish experience. Impacts on growth, health and welfare of the farmed fish are determined by these environment-biological complexities at farm level, and are also influenced by production strategies and industry decisions which may be based on social or economic factors. Robust, industry-relevant, climate impact assessment must include the complexities, relationships and trade-offs between different natural processes and human interventions. Thus, a more comprehensive approach which uses systems thinking to capture the interlinking interdisciplinary components is urgently needed. Precision aquaculture, where vast amounts of data are collected and analysed, offers a framework to provide the detail required to understand the complex farm system, evaluate how the environment is changing and assess implications for future production. In this FLF, I will deliver a rigorous scientific framework for assessing impact of climate change on marine aquaculture using systems thinking and precision-based information. I will create an approach which integrates detailed knowledge of what is happening in the complex farm system now, with future projections of climate change and potential stakeholder response. This will involve collecting high resolution data, analysing complex datasets, developing farm-level models, simulating future climate scenarios, and determining the adaptive capacity of the sector. I will work closely with my network of key industry partners, research organisations, regulators and policy makers to maximise translation and transfer of knowledge and approaches to industry and associated stakeholders. Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar) aquaculture in the Northeast Atlantic (Scotland and Norway) is used as a case study. Salmon leads marine fish production, with over 2 million tonnes produced each year, the equivalent of 17.5 billion meals. Norway and Scotland are responsible for 60% of production. The latitudinal range of farms extends across the thermal tolerance of the salmon, from temperate conditions in Scotland and south Norway, to arctic conditions in the north of Norway. This allows assessment of the spatio-temporal heterogeneity of climate change and a thorough analysis of how impact may vary between locations and different responses required. Beyond aquaculture, the positioning of marine fish farms offers an exceptional opportunity to gain deeper insight into the rate, magnitude and variability of climate change in coastal areas. This FLF will deliver vital new knowledge, data and approaches to understand how the environment is changing. This research is highly interdisciplinary, covering aspects of climate, environmental, biological and social science. The innovative techniques and transformative approaches will allow aquaculture to respond to the climate emergency, enhance blue economy opportunities and maximise its contribution to global food security.

The "Internet of Food Things" will create an interdisciplinary network that defragments and expands the UK's food digital economy. Food and drink is the largest manufacturing sector of the UK economy. The food supply chain from farm to consumer generates £108bn GVA per year and employs 3.9m people. In addition, food has highly significant social and environmental impacts. Obesity alone, including downstream health impacts such as diabetes, heart disease etc, costs the UK economy £49bn per annum. There are still c. 1,000,000 cases of food poisoning per year costing £1.5bn p.a.. Food generates up to 30% of the UK's road freight, but 10MT of food, generating 20MTCO2e of GHG emissions, are wasted each year. Digital technology has the potential to transform the food chain, for example, opportunities (that map onto the EPSRC DE Network strategy) include but are not limited to; - New business models via distributed ledger technology (DLT) to underpin the traceability of food. The recent Holmes report identified food as one of the key seven UK industry sectors most likely to benefit from DLTs. - The creation of a "data trust" for the food sector to underpin data sharing, trust and interoperability within complex supply chains. - Wide scale application of the internet of things (IoT) for the service community, for example, the use of IoT by domestic users (refrigerators, cooking devices etc) to improve health outcomes and reduce waste. - The development of new digital labelling protocols that assist with consumer use of food as well as supply chain optimisation, - The use of novel digital technologies (e.g. artificial intelligence) to reduce food waste by optimising whole supply chains from manufacturer to consumer. Hitherto these opportunities have not or are only partially realised. There is an urgent need to defragment the digitally inspired academic community and connect it to food industry practitioners. Although the digital focus is in within EPSRC's remit (IoT, blockchain, data trusts, interoperability issues), we will multiply impact by including interdisciplinary contributions from food science and technology practitioners, policy makers, engineers, management specialists and colleagues in social and behavioural sciences. The network will include academia, industry and consumer interests. The industry interest covers the whole food and digital innovation chain including food manufacturers (e.g. Food and Drink Federation, EPSRC Food CIM), IoT and digital specialists (Siemens and IMS Evolve), the HVM Catapult and regulators such as the Food Standards Agency and GS1 the international agency that sets data standards (bar codes) for retail. Consumers will be represented through out, but the inclusion of food retailers within the consortium provides access to unrivalled data sets demonstrating behaviours. The DE network will facilitate a number of key actions, including a marketing, social media and work shop / conference campaign that yields a large scale (up to 500 persons) network who have mutual interests within the food digital domain. We will host one main conference per year and in addition 3 facilitated workshops p.a. to deep dive key questions within the food domain. We will fund a range of pilot studies (£350K applied) and detailed reviews to underpin horizon scanning. All the research challenges will be co created with industry. We expect that the network will facilitate onward research funding and catalyse interest in the food digital economy. In addition to network activities, we will deliver a comprehensive pathway to impact that engages professional practitioners as well as the general public and schools.

The Innovative Manufacturing and Construction Research Centre (IMCRC) will undertake a wide variety of work in the Manufacturing, Construction and product design areas. The work will be contained within 5 programmes:1. Transforming Organisations / Providing individuals, organisations, sectors and regions with the dynamic and innovative capability to thrive in a complex and uncertain future2. High Value Assets / Delivering tools, techniques and designs to maximise the through-life value of high capital cost, long life physical assets3. Healthy & Secure Future / Meeting the growing need for products & environments that promote health, safety and security4. Next Generation Technologies / The future materials, processes, production and information systems to deliver products to the customer5. Customised Products / The design and optimisation techniques to deliver customer specific products.Academics within the Loughborough IMCRC have an internationally leading track record in these areas and a history of strong collaborations to gear IMCRC capabilities with the complementary strengths of external groups.Innovative activities are increasingly distributed across the value chain. The impressive scope of the IMCRC helps us mirror this industrial reality, and enhances knowledge transfer. This advantage of the size and diversity of activities within the IMCRC compared with other smaller UK centres gives the Loughborough IMCRC a leading role in this technology and value chain integration area. Loughborough IMCRC as by far the biggest IMRC (in terms of number of academics, researchers and in funding) can take a more holistic approach and has the skills to generate, identify and integrate expertise from elsewhere as required. Therefore, a large proportion of the Centre funding (approximately 50%) will be allocated to Integration projects or Grand Challenges that cover a spectrum of expertise.The Centre covers a wide range of activities from Concept to Creation.The activities of the Centre will take place in collaboration with the world's best researchers in the UK and abroad. The academics within the Centre will be organised into 3 Research Units so that they can be co-ordinated effectively and can cooperate on Programmes.

Addressing climate change through reducing carbon emissions is a crucial international goal. End use energy demand (EUED) reduction is essential for the UK to meet its legally binding 80% carbon reduction target and has significant economic and social benefits: it lowers the operating costs of businesses, increasing their competitiveness, and reduces the fuel bills for home owners, guarding against fuel poverty and improving quality of life. Government, industry and academia recognise the importance of EUED reduction and are responding by developing new policies, products and services. However, there is a shortage of highly trained individuals who will spearhead these initiatives. Recognising this, the Engineering and Physical Science Research Council (EPSRC) has identified EUED in buildings, transport and industry as a priority funding area for the development of a Centre for Doctoral Training (CDT). For the last 4 years, the UCL Energy Institute and the School of Civil and Building Engineering at Loughborough, have run a successful CDT: the London-Loughborough Centre for Doctoral Research in Energy Demand (LoLo). The Centre is seeking funding for a further 8 years to train 60 students. The scope will be expanded beyond buildings to include energy demand in transport and industry directly related to the built environment. The new Centre will build on the existing four year programme: a one year Masters of Research in Energy Demand followed by a three year PhD. Training will be enhanced by an annual colloquium; international summer school; team building away days; seminar series'; creativity, communication and business training; and numerous other activities. Students will undertake placements with partners and in relevant overseas organisations. They will have a firm grounding in core skills and knowledge, but appreciate the multi-disciplinary perspective needed to understand the technical, economic and social factors that shape energy demand. The Centre's research will address new challenges within five themes, grouped around major research programmes: technology and systems, energy epidemiology, urban scale energy demand, building performance and process, and unintended consequences. This linkage ensures students' work gains momentum, is at the forefront of knowledge, has excellent resources, and is supported by a wide group of world class academics. The Centre will again be led by Profs Lowe and Lomas; together they have over 60 years of experience in energy and buildings. They will be supported by Academic Managers and Administrators and over 40 academic supervisors whose expertise spans the full range of disciplines necessary for EUED research: from science and engineering to ergonomics and design, psychology and sociology through to economics and politics. An Advisory Board will help steer the Centre, whilst the wider group of 26 partners, representing policy, industry, academia and NGO interests, will aid students' training by: developing projects, offering mentoring, hosting students in their organisation, giving workshops and seminars, and direct funding. The proposed new Centre represents excellent value for money. The total cost to the EPSRC to train 60 students is less than the current Centre cost to train 40 students. However, the funding per student will rise by 20%, a result of the financial commitment of our partners and host institutions. The Centre aims to have an enduring impact through our graduates and their research. Short term impact will be achieved through students' engagement with industry, policy makers, NGOs and academia through the annual Colloquium, the international summer school, publications, the web-site and other social media, working with partners and through public engagement. In the long term our graduates will help transform the EUED sector through projects they lead, the students and colleagues they will train and the organisations they influence.