Why industrial clusters are key to delivering the UK’s Net Zero aspirations

There is one quote that continually sticks in my mind, from the wise Greek philosopher Heraclitus, who said in 500BC?"The only thing that is constant is change".?

This rings true in all aspects of life with some pretty radical changes experienced over the last 2 years. Looking forward the thing that excites me most is the pace of change required to address planetary needs, to ensure our home remains in good health for future generations.?

Humanity faces some of the biggest challenges in recent history, requiring sustained global collaboration on a scale that is to my knowledge, unprecedented. Whilst there are many priorities that require focus, one of the most pressing needs is to consider the role of energy in a more sustainable economy, serving as the lifeblood that powers all aspects of modern life.?

A key question is where to start, given the scale of the challenge and the looming deadline, with a reduction of 78% of greenhouse gas emissions by 2035 required, a target set by UK Government as part of the UK's decarbonisation strategy.?

In response to this question 6 major industrial clusters have been setup by UK Government, as collaborative ventures which aim to decarbonise industry, which account for nearly 40% of all GHC emissions. Our joint white paper with Accenture and the Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre provides a view as to the important role of clusters in meeting our national ambitions for Net Zero.

So, what is an industrial cluster? In simple terms, it’s a geographical area comprised of co-located companies from one or more industries. They might be heavy industries such as cement, steel or chemicals, or lighter industries like food processing or electronics. But the common thread is that they’re all energy-intensive, and high producers of carbon emissions that are very hard to abate.

Abating them is exactly what industrial clusters enable us to do. And the key is the co-location of various companies and industries in one place. This makes it much faster and more economic for each participant to transform its production processes to generate less carbon, because they can all spread the fixed costs by sharing infrastructure. There are also opportunities to introduce “circular” models” by reusing the waste outputs from one industry as an input to another: such as using CO2 captured from cement production as an input to food processing.

The reality is that the scale of the challenge is so vast, no single company can do this alone, therefore collaboration has become an imperative. The clusters model provides an environment to develop eco-systems of like-minded companies and individuals, who together can accelerate the hydrogen economy and carbon capture and storage technologies. Importantly the clusters model is a global model, meaning that as the UK accelerates new technologies in this space, we can unlock new export and trade opportunities.

Digital and data remain at the heart of the clusters model, enabling the eco-systems to share data in a trusted environment, that can generate timely information to support decision making, scenario planning, simulation, automation and application of Artificial Intelligence.

?As we embark on this journey, the prize couldn’t be bigger: a lower-carbon or ultimately no-carbon planet. The message? For the UK, the road to net zero starts and ends with industrial clusters. Get this right, and we’ll not only help to save the planet – but also find the rest of the world beating a path to our door. Let’s make it happen. Together.

Regards?

Kevin Reeves