Abstract
Executive Summary. The Food-Energy-Water Local Nexus Network (LNN) for redistributed manufacturing focuses on the development of local nexuses of food manufacturing and energy and water supply which may provide opportunities for rationally customising resource utilisation, production, and consumption while contributing to the shared prosperity between business and community, and between human society and natural ecosystems. This network involves a multidisciplinary academic team across six UK universities working with representative stakeholders that will study the local nexuses along four research themes: engineering, business, policy and society, and systems integration. Two case study locales provide a common background for different research themes to interact and integrate, and will serve purposes ranging from collection of empirical data to stakeholder engagement. These two case studies represent respectively situations of “new development”, (Northstowe, Cambridgeshire, where opportunities exist to introduce a new food, energy and water system), and “retrofitting” (Oxford, where an existing system is to be changed to benefit from the paradigm of local nexuses). The work will be developed through six inter-related feasibility projects. This report covers the work undertaken to date within the Energy Feasibility Study. The specific objectives of the Energy Feasibility study are: 1. Assess requirements for energy supply (electricity and heat of different qualities) to localised food systems (e.g. production, storage), including typical temporal (diurnal and seasonal) variations 2. Assess opportunities for energy integration across the local supply and production chains (e.g. CO2 emissions to be used in green-houses to aid tomatoes ripen, re-use heat loss from cooling down after evaporation etc.). 3. Assess potential for energy recovery from waste arisings from food production across the local supply chain, plus arisings from local water/wastewater treatment systems 4. Develop local energy system scenarios, including other potential users 5. Evaluate energy generation and storage technologies suitable for implementing the scenarios: efficiency, cost effectiveness, safety, and environmental impact Based on the objectives above, existing literature and data were reviewed on the Nexus and the linkages between Energy and Water, Energy and Food etc. A review of existing academic and grey literature and data on energy use for the production of two chosen food products: tomato paste and bread, is also summarised in this report, and a detailed study of selected energy system scenarios linked to bread manufacturing processes is also presented illustrating the current situation versus a possible future where redistributed manufacturing (RDM) would be more widespread.