Member Article

UK gains international recognition for efforts to reduce carbon emissions

The efforts of British businesses to reduce carbon emissions have been recognised internationally, after the UK was named as one of the top countries working towards reducing carbon emissions.

In the RICS Global Zero Carbon Capacity Index, UK carbon reduction policies were ranked third globally, behind Norway and Brazil.

The index uses three indicators to assess advances towards a decarbonised environment; consumption of energy in the residential, tertiary and transport sectors, and frameworks in place to promote carbon reductions.

Despite doing well overall, there is still work to be done in the UK. While residential carbon emission figures have improved from 2008, Britain is still firmly mid table.

The UK is also one of the worst performers on renewable energy contributions, though slow improvement in this area reflects time and efforts needed to shift the basis of energy generation.

Nonetheless the results do show the government that the government is beginning to take the issue of carbon emissions seriously as a mainstream issue.

Chris Hayward, managing director of Renew Plus was keen to note that the UK is currently in the process of investing on renewable energy infrastructure projects, which will take time to impact on the UK’s renewable energy performance as a whole.

He commented: “One thing we must not forget is that the current downturn in markets, global recession, austerity measures all impact on our consumption and production, and this has in turn affected carbon emissions.

“The wrong interpretation may be put on this new downward dip in the emissions graph – it is probably not the result of our climate change mitigation measures in recent times but our reduced spending, consumption and production causing this.”

The government Green Deal is set to come into effect in 2012, and alongside renewable heat incentives and feed in tariffs, will provide further opportunities for expansion into the renewable sector.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .