What is the low carbon economy worth to the UK?

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A Small High-Impact Gloucestershire-based consultancy defines low-carbon economy for major Government report.

Sustainable Direction Ltd (SDL) is pleased to announce that the results of a new investigation into the size of the UK’s low-carbon economy have been published by the Government, and SDL is the author of the definitions used to create the figures. A year in the making, the report was produced in conjunction with Trends in Business Research (TBR), who led the overall project, using SDL’s definitions that were approved by the Department for Business Innovation and Skills (BIS), the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) to quantify this major and growing sector

Headline figures from the report:

The low carbon economy and its supply chain:

• Generates turnover of £120 bn
• Is worth nearly £45 bn in GVA
• Provides over 460,000 jobs
• Is two-and-a-half times the size of the pharmaceutical sector

SDL’s role was vital in producing these and other statistics as the definitions had to be accurate as well as transparent and current.

“Defining the low-carbon economy means drawing a line around the supply chain of products and services within the UK economy and determining what is ‘low-carbon’ and what is not,” says MD Dr John Henry Looney.  “This is a critical step towards quantifying the sector, and one that took a lot of work.”

“We are pleased and excited to have contributed to this project, which means that from now on when government Ministers refer to the low-carbon economy they have a solid, transparent figure to work from.”  This transparency is a key subtlety to the work – “In the future, if a new product appears or an old one develops into a step-change in carbon savings, it can easily be included,” said Becki Clark, one of the authors.

You can read the report here.  Please call us to discuss it!  01452 382218