One of the key challenges identified in the first round of UKMSN+ studies are related to the development of information sharing platforms that enable and support industrial symbiosis. However, in Feb’21 the UK Government put the National Materials Database (NMDHub) project on hold but it re-iterated support for their Product Passport vision, in order to identify the quantity and type of critical raw materials within a given product, and introduce labelling and information requirements as part of the Environment Bill, for example; repairability rating, common faults and remedies, spare parts, instructions for common repairs and upgrades etc.
The aim of this 16 month feasibility project is to generate and test new concepts for product passports in order to contribute significantly to the national effort by developing and evaluating a technical demonstrator of a concept for a product passport system and a data publishing specification. The government recognises the need to take a ‘whole-systems’ approach and it is this context this project proposal has been conceived.
Our research project aims to answer the following questions:
- How viable is the notion of a product passport for resource identification and exchange, from a whole systems perspective, and what technologies, data model and distributed architecture might underpin its use to enable cross-industry utility?
- Which concepts of operation for product passports, are most feasible in the context of enabling new business models, ecosystems and circular economy capability?
- What circular economy (holistic) insights could product passports enable with extended capability e.g. data innovations and data-enabled infrastructures like Data trusts, distributed ledger, AI, and connected/smart technologies?
Project Approach
The project will utilise participatory research and collaborative design and development approaches as much as possible, including Systems Thinking and Hackathon style workshops. Our project is different because it aims to break down silos, apply data-driven innovation principles and focus on System of System capability by looking at:
What sort of data and information should an open product passport contain that will enable cross-industry applicability and opportunities for new value streams? What is core and priority critical materials across sectors and within products? What data should be public domain v commercially sensitive? What information architectures would facilitate re-use and integrations? What technologies could be used for data capture etc? How would a product passport work in the context of product-service systems and more complex systems comprised of multiple sub-systems and modular components? What policy frameworks, regulations and governance might be needed? How feasible are our proposals and what are the practical considerations?
If you would like to get involved, please get in touch with me via email: m.r.n.king@lboro.ac.uk
Dr Melanie King, Loughborough University 