Making Green Work
Building a new green industrial strategy for the UK to 2030
Discover our latest Interchange report as we look at some of the hurdles ahead for a green industrial revolution.
Making Green Work
In November 2020, the UK Government set out a Ten Point Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution with the approach they planned to take to ‘build back better, support green jobs, and accelerate our path to net zero’.
This provided a focus of ambition around the core sectors of energy, transportation and mobility, and the built and natural environments, alongside intent relating to carbon capture, usage and storage (CCUS) and green finance.
COP26 provided the platform to raise the critical need to speed up this agenda. But how do we all get there, and truly make green work for everyone?
Through a series of Interchange events in 2021-2022 we have benefited from a range of perspectives on what a green industrial revolution means for organisations and individuals and what challenges they are facing strategically and operationally to enact and enable critical change and maximise the benefit of associated investment and transformation.
In this report, we set out the recommendations for how some of the hurdles faced can be overcome, unlocking wider opportunity, and ensuring the green industrial revolution works for everyone.
Discover the report
Our latest Interchange report, Making Green Work, explores how we make a green future work economically for the UK, published in collaboration with Jacobs, Gowling WLG and Thales.
Discover the key sections and findings from the report on this page and download the report below.
Recommendations
The report looks at six key areas needed to drive a green industrial revolution, and sets out recommended steps for government and businesses.
Discover more about the six key areas below and read the report to find out more about the recommendations.
Investing in the skills to support green jobs
Future employment will depend on being able to think, talk and act in a climate positive way. There are vast numbers of green jobs emerging, however, The Green Jobs Taskforce notes there is a significant lag between industry identifying the need for skills, and training workers in those skills.
Many people will need to upskill their existing role or transition into a new role altogether.
Improving climate and environmental literacy
Environmental literacy is the awareness and concern about the environment and its associated problems, alongside the knowledge, skills and motivation to work toward solutions of current problems and the prevention of new ones.
If we want everyone to start understanding the scale of the problem, we need to make the relevant terminology accessible, in the hope that everyone will have the ability to acquire a basic standard of climate literacy.
Making green decisions easier
While the green agenda has gained popularity in recent times, it’s currently facing pressure from competing issues. There’s a real risk that the whole agenda will be blown off course by the immediate cost of living crisis.
How can we expect people to think about changing their habits when there are other very real issues like paying for heating and food?
Understanding the climate risks
To avoid making green work is now a matter of risk. Reputational risk, risk of loss of value of investments, loss of opportunities created by failure to invest in low carbon or other sustainable product and service lines, and an inability to attract capital and finance for projects/businesses that don’t meet enhanced environmental performance levels.
With carbon commitments now a common feature for both businesses and countries, the risks of not undertaking action on climate need to be assessed, and the right strategies formulated as a result.
Collaboration between businesses, governments and education
The continued silo operation, sector-by-sector, organisation-by-organisation, project-by-project approach presents a major challenge to addressing net zero.
To solve problems and identify step change solutions we need a more holistic and integrated approach that brings together employers, industry bodies and academia and is supported by strong policies, legislation and funding.
Technology and innovation
We need to harness our increased access to data to drive digital innovation and create the solutions that mitigate the impacts of climate change. Innovation is essential in order to solve the climate challenge and the UK needs to take a leading role.
Investment in cleaner, renewable power will continue to grow and there’s an emerging opportunity for data, technology and innovation to push even further, and develop into a profitable growth industry for the UK. The technology available and implemented now will likely be in place in 2050 so will provide a significant contribution to us meeting net zero targets.