Innovation can help the revolution to net zero

Professor Richard Templer, Director of Innovation, Grantham Institute called for everyone to play their part in tackling climate change at the BIG South London Innovation Growth Summit on 29 November at Kingston University’s Townhouse.

In the closing keynote speech, he discussed the current level of greenhouse gases, with emissions continuing to go up every year, and the challenges that are now being faced, requiring change to happen faster, and becoming more costly.

Mr Templer described the country as going through a revolution with innovation needed to drive this forward, whether through technological advancements or any ideas that can be usefully applied, particularly when looking at retrofitting homes.

London has the opportunity to innovate in this space as one of the world’s biggest clean tech ecosystems. With 250,000 people in London working in the sector, and sales before COVID at £48bn per annum, whilst growing at 10% per year.

Mr Templer highlighted four key elements which were required in delivering climate change objectives:

• Governance – ensuring there are clear definitions and targets and people with the authority to enforce it.
• Carbon Literacy – giving people the power to shape the future, teaching them how they can be carbon neutral.
• Leadership – people need to be told some hard truths and be persuaded that change has to happen if we want to get to where we need to be.
• Ecosystem – there is a need for a net zero ecosystem, so everyone can reliably make the changes they need to, with people trained to carry out the work and interconnected to make the transition as smooth as possible.

He concluded: “We are facing interesting challenges and interesting times. A challenge for us, but one hopefully that we can all rise to.”