What is the role of Low Carbon Leaders in the race to net zero?

There are few targets that unite an entire business community, country - or indeed the human race... but we have one right now: 1.5 degrees.

Low carbon businesses have an opportunity to achieve something incredibly special: carbon negativity. This means drawing down more carbon from the atmosphere than your business emits.

Rather than asking "how do we achieve net zero emissions?" the role of low carbon businesses is to aim for sub zero emissions. The question then becomes "what is the most we can do to reduce carbon in the atmosphere?"

Unless enough companies take this position, we are unlikely to reach global carbon reductions in the timeframe needed to limit global warming to 1.5 or even 2 degrees. The impact of missing this target would be catastrophic.

Many businesses have huge carbon footprints that will take years of investment and innovation to achieve net zero. Companies in the oil & gas sector, heavy industry, construction, aviation and agriculture have the largest carbon emissions, and reaching net zero will not be easy or cheap. The time required will likely be measured in decades rather than years.

Companies in the service sector and therefore do not manufacture or distribute a physical product, have a relatively low carbon footprint. In fact, the average office-based SME emits less than 1,000 tons of carbon each year, contributing a very small percentage of total green house gas emissions.

Net zero for many of these businesses is not a challenging or costly target.