Use Less climate policy

Nuclear power construction

Adding up and Deployment Rates: We have shown that all climate policy depends on three physical resources (emissions-free electricity, carbon storage, biomass). Demand for these resources will exceed supply in the time available and faster deployment is constrained by important social processes.

Demand side prioritisation

Demand side prioritisation. As a result of this problem, demand-side solutions (that reduce demand for energy, materials and ruminants in particular) are essential, under-prioritised, can be attractive and invite new innovation but are limited by societal willingness to participate in change.

Electric Arc Furnace

Industrial decarbonisation. These two insights set a different agenda for industrial mitigation, prioritising electrically-powered recycling where possible, and requiring substantial reductions in material demand. Both priorities create exciting new opportunities for innovation.

Material efficiency policy image

Material efficiency policy: We have shown that conventional thinking about carbon pricing creates a relatively weak driver for material efficiency, because for most materially intensive products (like buildings or vehicles), raw material costs contribute only a small fraction of total costs.

Anaerobic digestor

Other: We have made a pragmatic assessment of the potential for anaerobic digestion to contribute to gas supply in the UK. 

Find out more...

Open up the links below for more information and our relevant publications on each topic

Main contributions:

Bojana Bajzelj continued Jonathan Cullen's work on data intensive top-down analyses, creating a Sankey Diagram showing how six different allocations of the world's greenhouse gas emissions relate to each other.

Sarah Nelson examined the deployment rates of the six fastest national energy technology deployments (e.g. of wind power in Denmark, or nuclear power in France) and contrasted them with six societal changes (e.g. the phase out of asbestos or CFC gases). She demonstrated that social transformations could be faster than technical change and have shorter lead-times.

Our report "Absolute Zero", the first output of the UK FIRES programme, made a pragmatic estimate of how the UK could deliver 100% decarbonisation by 2050, shortly after the UK's Climate Change Act was changed to target this goal in 2019. The report showed that, with realistic deployment rates, the UK would have little if any carbon capture and storage or additional biomass, so mitigation required 100% electrification, cutting energy demand by 40% and  closure of any processes that would continue to emit even if electrified.  The report gained widespread attention including a full debate in the House of Lords in February 2020. 

Jenny Hawkin demonstrated that all mitigation policies depend on three fundamental physical resources (emissions-free electricity, carbon storage and biomass). She built an exhaustive library of process models (in the SI of her paper) to predict the demand for these resources required by major international policy packages and contrasted them with the fastest feasible expansion of supply to demonstrate that current policy cannot deliver within its projected timescales.

To explore the limits to delivery timelines in more detail, Julian Allwood has worked with the second cohort of the FIBE3 doctoral training scheme to create a special issue of the proceedings of the UK's Institution of Civil Engineers, with ten case studies of nationally significant infrastructure projects. This is currently under review, but the key result is that pre-construction on average takes 2.3 times longer than construction, and this time is essential for co-design and evaluation by the many stakeholders involved in large public projects.

Journal papers:

Major reports:

  • Allwood J.M., Alarva, B.., et al. (2026). Unlocking Net Zero: Roadmap 2026. 56 pages. EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Future Infrastructure and Built Environment: Unlocking Net Zero, DOI: 10.17863/CAM.130947
  • Stephenson, S., Horton, P.M. and Allwood, J.M. (2021) Minus 45: Delivering the UK government’s pledge to COP26: Cutting UK emissions by 45% from 2018 to 2030. 26 pages. UK FIRES, DOI:10.17863/CAM.77056.
  • Allwood, JM, et al. (2019) Absolute Zero: Delivering the UK’s climate change commitment with incremental changes to today’s technologies. 56 pages. UK FIRES, DOI:10.17863/CAM.46075. This  report was the topic of a full debate in the House of Lords on 6th February 2020.

Main contributions:

The obvious consequence of our work on aggregation and deployment rates is that current "techno-optimistic" climate policy cannot deliver through supply-side solutions only. Therefore, mitigation actions that reduce demand for the activities that cause emissions is essential and current under-prioritised, but creates a rich space for innovation.

Sarah Nelson's paper compares the "disruption" of a wide portfolio of options, spanning supply and demand side options, while Sam Stephenson's work looks at the danger that techno-optimism creates a form of lock-in that inhibits demand side implementation.

The more recent paper and report by Julian Allwood and the first cohort of the FIBE3 doctoral training scheme uses credible deployment rates of both technical and societal change to demonstrate how critical demand-side actions are.

The major reports of the UK FIRES consortium cited below reveal the vast innovation space for demand side measures as a whole, and in key sectors.

Journal papers:

Major reports:

  • Allwood J.M., Baker F., et al. (2025). Unlocking Net Zero: Roadmap 2025. 36 pages. EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Future Infrastructure and Built Environment: Unlocking Net Zero, DOI: 10.17863/CAM.118457
  • Hawkins, W., Drewniok, M.P., Dunant, C., Horton, P.M., Romain, P., Stephenson, S., Sergent, F. & Allwood, J.M. (2022). Construction Sector Innovation within Absolute Zero: Business growth in a transformative journey to zero emissions. Apollo - University of Cambridge Repository. https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.90553
  • Cleaver, C., Azevedo, J., Horton, P., Cullen, J., & Allwood, J. M. (2022). Materials & Manufacturing: Business growth in a transformative journey to zero emissions. 58 pages. UK FIRES, doi.org/10.17863/CAM.79915
  • Skelton, A. C., Allwood, J. M., Horton, P. M. (2022). Energy Sector Innovation within Absolute Zero. 42 pages. UK FIRES, //doi.org/10.17863/CAM.79914
  • Allwood, J.M. (2021). Entrepreneurs not Emissions: New business opportunities to fill the gap in UK emissions policy. 48 pages. UK FIRES, DOI:10.17863/CAM.76789

Main contributions:

Our first major paper on this topic in 2010 demonstrated that there were no routes to cut industrial emissions even by 50% using substitute primary production processes, so that demand side action was essential.

The more recent paper by Lukas Gast shows that, even with an implausible liberty to re-design all the world's major material production sites, industrial symbiosis (sharing waste heat and resources between industrial sites) could have only a small impact on industrial mitigation.

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Main contributions:

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Journal papers:

Main contributions:

Sam Stephenson's analysis explored the slow progress of UK mitigation after the Covid pandemic.

Camilla Hurst's analysis of the potential for producing biomethane by anaerobic digestion in the UK is limited to around 7% of total current gas demand, but that this could be important if prioritised for hard-to-decarbonise sectors like brick production. The modest contribution is limited by feedstock availability, and is important as larger contributions claimed by the industrial lobby depend on an implausible diversion of agricultural harvest.

Sarah Nelson's report on ZERPAs proposes a financial mechanism to allow corporates to demonstrate (or not) the reality of their claims to be on track for zero emissions by purchasing Procurement Agreements for future access to the three physical resources prioritised in Jenny Hawkin's work cited above.

Journal papers:

Major reports:

  • Nelson, S., Low, H. Allwood, J.M. (2021) ZERPAs: Financing the transition to net zero under future zero-emissions resource supply constraints. 26 pages. UK FIRES, DOI:10.17863/CAM.75569