The Low Carbon Economy – From Stick to Carrot

14th September 2015

Britain is at risk of missing a huge opportunity. Policymakers must stop hitting firms with the big stick of ever-higher carbon taxes and levies, eroding their global competitiveness. Instead, they should be offering carrots, incentives to install energy saving equipment, invest in unexplored low-carbon technologies ahead of the curve, and become leaders in the low-carbon markets that must inevitably boom over the next couple of decades if governments around the world are to meet their climate change targets.

A government study published earlier this year suggests the UK’s low-carbon economy is already as big as the food and drink sector and twice the size of the chemicals industry, contributing £55 billion to the national economy and experiencing healthy growth.

For manufacturers, climate change policy has for too long been burdensome. The UK should seek to make its ambitious climate change targets a matter of economic ambition. Business and government need to work together to invest in making the low-carbon future not only transformational, but profitable.

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