New measurement strategy to underpin UK growth, innovation and environment

On 6th July 2011, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills will launch its National Measurement Strategy for 2011 – 2015. The strategy is designed to exploit the Government's investment in measurement research to support economic growth and to improve the UK's competitiveness and scientific excellence across all areas of business and government.

Ongoing support of measurement is critical to meeting the challenges of modern life. Good measurement allows us to understand the effects of climate change, ensures medical treatments effectively target disease, and enables high-quality products to be designed and produced. Accurate measurement also increases our understanding of the universe and provides the basis of much scientific research.

The Government will invest around £240m over the next four years in providing and developing the UK's scientific and legal measurement infrastructure.

David Willetts, Minister for Universities and Science, will launch the National Measurement System (NMS) strategy at the Royal Society's Summer Science Exhibition. The strategy will be led by the National Measurement Office and delivered through the world leading research facilities at the National Physical Laboratory (NPL), LGC and NEL.

The NMS will support the Government's goal of strong, sustainable growth by:

• Providing complete confidence in measurement standards on which society, government and business rely.
• Boosting innovation by advancing measurement techniques and technologies to stimulate new products, processes and services, and develop new skills.

Commenting on the launch, David Willetts said:

"I am very proud to be the Minister in the Coalition Government responsible for Measurement. British science and engineering has measurement at its heart. The UK can rightly be proud of the advances in measurement science made over the centuries. This tradition continues today in the UK's world-leading national measurement infrastructure that underpins economic growth, business enterprise, commercial transactions, consumer confidence and academic endeavour."

"Investment in the NMS will be focused on sectors where the UK is strong, or has the potential to be strong in international markets, and where advances in measurement science can support that strong position."

Willets concludes: "Through the Strategy for the NMS, the national investment in measurement science will therefore be exploited to the benefit of UK business and the citizen, to generate new knowledge, promote growth and innovation, and address key societal challenges."

These sectors include energy, health, manufacturing, digital industries, sustainability and security. The work will span all industries and affect everyone's lives. A few particular areas of focus will be:

• Increase the speed to market of low-carbon and energy generation technologies by supporting their development and proving their claims
• Help the UK meet carbon reduction targets by verifying reductions
• Enable new drugs and therapies, and diagnostic technologies to be brought to the market quickly, safely, and at lower cost, and to be deployed and used with confidence
• Provide the infrastructure for next generation communication systems, such as smart energy meters
• Continue to research more accurate ways to measure, including contributing to the international effort to redefine selected SI units. This has applications in research, such as better understanding the shape of the universe, and will benefit business through developments such as faster internet, smaller microchips, more accurate GPS, advances in nanotechnology, fuel cells, and new medical treatments.

The rational for the new strategy is the strong return on investment consistently provided by funding of measurement.

• An independent survey of businesses found that in a single year the NMS infrastructure helped businesses introduce products and processes that increased profitability by more than £700m
• Case studies carried out to quantify the impact of specific NMS projects typically show a return on investment of between 10 and 30 times
• Each year in the UK, around £340 billion worth of goods are sold on the basis of the measurement of their quantity. In addition £280 billion of industrial goods are weighed or measured.
• One project carried out by NPL explored how mobile antennas behave. Evaluations showed that the calibration data improvements supplied by NPL could have equated to a 1% one-off saving in network capital costs, or around £50 million.

Dr Brian Bowsher, Managing Director of the National Physical Laboratory, said "measurement is often overlooked but without it we wouldn't be able to live our lives as we do. Advances in measurement have lead to innovations such as high speed digital communications, GPS and satellite technology. NPL have even measured materials in formula 1 cars, lighting effects on old masters and the crunchiness of biscuits. Measurement helps contribute billions of pounds to the UK and global economies every year. The ongoing commitment of the Government to measurement will ensure the UK remains a world leading centre of science, business and innovation".

Notes

The Launch of the strategy will take place at the Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition, 6th July 2011, 11am, in front of the National Physical Laboratory's stand featuring Energy Harvesting.

Royal Society, 6-9 Carlton House Terrace, London, SW1Y 5AG

Energy harvesting is a process that captures energy that would otherwise be lost as heat, light, sound, vibration or motion. It can use this captured energy to improve the efficiency of existing systems or even to power new technologies. NPL is part of the Metrology for Energy Harvesting project - a research collaboration that brings together Europe's expertise in measurement, energy harvesting and systems engineering. The consortium's research aims to make various energy-harvesting technologies more efficient and practical. It ultimately wants to help industry to develop energy harvesting technologies to lower costs and increase energy efficiency.

Sample list of areas where measurement brings benefits to business government and society In the private sector:

• Design - Bringing products to market quickly requires the design to be right first time and is achieved using analytical models of the product and its subsystems, components, materials and manufacturing process. Validation of these models depends critically upon detailed measurement.
• Development - Quantitative measurement of the performance of a product or service plays a critical role in feeding the next development cycle
• Product quality - A process that is poorly controlled leads to high levels of waste and increased costs. Controlling quality during manufacture relies fundamentally on measurement.
• Customer requirements - Customers purchase products against a specification of their requirements, which usually depends on parameters defined through measurement
• Sales and procurement - Customers rely on standards and certification processes to simplify and lend confidence to their procurements

In the public sector:

• Healthcare - prognosis, diagnosis, manufacture and delivery of therapies
• Food - safety, authenticity and traceability
• Environmental protection - air, water and soil quality, waste, industrial and landfill emissions, noise, ionising radiations
• Health and safety - including product safety and performance of personal protective equipment
• Security and defence - anti-counterfeiting and maintenance of mechanical, electrical, communications and other systems
• Taxation - of trade in taxable goods such as oil, gas, alcohol
• Fair trading - consumer protection and competitive markets via trading standards

The National Physical Laboratory (NPL) is the UK's National Measurement Institute and one of the UK's leading science facilities and research centres. It is a world-leading centre of excellence in developing and applying the most accurate standards, science and technology available.

NPL occupies a unique position as the UK's National Measurement Institute and sits at the intersection between scientific discovery and real world application. Its expertise and original research have underpinned quality of life, innovation and competitiveness for UK citizens and business for more than a century.

The National Measurement System (NMS) is the collective infrastructure of national facilities, expertise, knowledge, research and legal framework for reliable, consistent and internationally recognised measurement. The infrastructure encompasses essential elements of both the public and private sectors:

• The National Measurement Office (NMO) which provides the focus for the strategic development of the system and sets the regulatory framework
• The four NMS laboratories (National Physical Laboratory - NPL, LGC, NEL and NMO)
• Around 1500 accredited calibration and testing laboratories (largely in the private sector)
• Private sector manufacturers of instrumentation and control systems that apply the standards and expertise of the NMS laboratories
• The quality control and assurance capabilities of private sector companies and public sector organisations who apply these instruments and control systems to the production of manufactured goods, operation of processes, delivery of services and regulatory compliance.