“Build Back Greener” - The UK’s Green Industrial Revolution

On the 18th of November 2020, Prime Minister of the UK, Boris Johnson, announced his ten-point plan to “Build Back Greener”. 

This plan is the UK government’s strategy for a Green Industrial Revolution. It aims to use clean technology to create jobs and build back the economy after the decline caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.

£12 billion of government investment will be made available to create and support  ~250,000 highly-skilled green jobs in the UK. This is forecast to spur over three times as much private sector investment by 2030.

The ten points for the UK’s Green Industrial Revolution are:

1. Offshore wind: Producing enough offshore wind to power every home and supporting up to 60,000 jobs.
2. Hydrogen: Generate low carbon hydrogen production capacity by 2030 for industry, transport, power and homes.
3. Nuclear: Advancing nuclear as a clean energy source which could support 10,000 jobs.
4. Electric vehicles: Electric car manufacturing and infrastructure.
5. Public transport, cycling and walking: Investment in zero-emission transport.
6. Jet Zero and greener maritime: Supporting difficult-to-decarbonise industries.
7. Homes and public buildings: Making our buildings greener, warmer and more energy-efficient, whilst creating 50,000 jobs by 2030, and a target to install 600,000 heat pumps every year by 2028. The Green Homes Grant has also been extended for an extra year.
8. Carbon capture: Capture and store harmful emissions away from the atmosphere.
9. Nature: Protecting and restoring our natural environment, creating 1000s of jobs.
10. Innovation and finance: Developing the cutting-edge technologies needed to reach these new energy ambitions and make the City of London the global centre of green finance.

The Green Industrial Revolution’s plan has a foreword by the PM where he said: 

“We will turn the UK into the world’s number one centre for green technology and finance, laying the foundations for decades of economic growth by delivering net zero emissions in a way that creates jobs and allows us to carry on living our lives.”

The PM’s quote highlights the importance of the UK’s role in the early stages of the global net-zero transition. It is vital that rich countries, like the UK, move first and make the biggest changes to reduce emissions. This provides poorer countries with a window where their emissions can increase as they industrialise and their wealth increases. Once reaching a level of significant industrialisation, these countries can afford to begin decarbonisation efforts. These efforts can then be supported by rich countries freely sharing renewable technologies with less developed countries.

The ten-step plan is the UK’s commitment to being a world-leader in cutting emissions, encouraging other nations to follow suit (The UK has led the G7 countries in cutting emissions since 1990). 

The PM finishes his foreword by saying:

“So let us meet the most enduring threat to our planet with one of the most innovative and ambitious programmes of job-creation we have known.”

It is clear that the PM’s plan to “Build Back Greener” will transform the UK’s identity. Two centuries ago the UK led the world’s first Industrial Revolution. Today, the UK will mobilise the same forces to level up into a green country of the future. By investing in clean technologies – wind, carbon capture, hydrogen and many others – Britain can lead the world into a new Green Industrial Revolution

Read the full plan here. 

If you would like to read our blog on the future of domestic heating, click here.