Even as the global economy deals with multiple major, foundation-shaking shocks, the climate crisis remains the most pressing existential threat facing us all. The UK government has set ambitious targets for decarbonisation, and their commitment is mirrored across the private sector. However, there is a pressing need for coordinated, well thought-out action on multiple spatial scales to make these goals a reality.
Building on our foundational 2019 report The Route To Clean Growth, our clean growth workstream will examine how local actors in our regions are readying their places for the transition to net zero, and attempt to formulate policy solutions to obstacles on this path.
As climate shifts worldwide, councils across England are being hit by increasingly extreme weather patterns including violent storm surges, unbearable temperatures, and widespread flooding. Even under the most minimal of warming scenarios, infrastructure, public health, and GDP will all worsen due to the weighty pressure of extreme weather events. If action is not taken, the […]
Elected on a platform with strong emphasis on energy security and decarbonisation, the UK Government has set a goal of ‘clean power’ by 2030 and established Great British Energy (GB Energy) to drive progress through investment in and development of clean energy projects. The Local Power Plan, a component of GB Energy, aims to support […]
In autumn 2021, Localis published ‘Plain Dealing – building for flood resilience’. The study took for its context the sense that development on flood risk areas sits at the intersection of the housing and climate crises. In the three years since publication 22 named storms have made impact on the UK and Ireland – In […]
In the context of a national housing crisis, soaring global temperatures and sluggish productivity growth, the next political cycle is likely to be characterised by the vexing problem of improving the public realm in a situation of parlous public finances. Recent crises have left the state with very little fiscal headroom, yet the political and […]
Over the last thirty years landfill policy has been among the most successful and singularly effective of government environmental policies. Since its introduction, the UK Landfill Tax has succeeded in drastically reducing mixed municipal waste to landfill by 90 percent. However, there is a principled, place-based case for future long term policy reform to address […]
This short report is part of our ongoing series on the construction of a Local Resilience Act. As climate shifts worldwide, councils across England are being hit by increasingly extreme weather patterns including violent storm surges, unbearable temperatures, and widespread flooding. At the level of place, our local authorities are best situated to understand and […]
This short report is part of our ongoing series on the construction of a Local Resilience Act. As climate shifts worldwide, councils across England are being hit by increasingly extreme weather patterns including violent storm surges, unbearable temperatures, and widespread flooding. At the level of place, our local authorities are best situated to understand and […]
Council finances are in a precarious position. Wound tightly from the time of the astringencies of the 2010 spending review, to the limited protections that saw the sector through the Covid years, the principal cogs of local government finance – property taxes, commercial revenue, fees and charges, capital expenditure and grant funding, are clearly out […]
As the impacts of climate change become clearer every year, the UK must be better prepared for the manifold impacts of extreme weather events, including floods. In England alone, some 5.4 million homes – one-in-six – are at risk of flooding, with many of them susceptible to surface water flooding. Flood resilience is a public […]
The UK is committed to reaching net zero by 2050, with numerous pieces of legislation enshrining the target and backing this politically. Understanding what needs to be done to drive decarbonisation, and what accompanying opportunities there are for increasing prosperity in the long-term, is crucial to realising this goal. Across the public sector landscape, this […]