Net Zero North West Cluster Plan Interim Findings
Summary
The North West boasts the largest concentration of advanced manufacturing and chemical production in the UK and is home to
a concentration of energy intensive users. Industrial consumers in the region emit nearly 17 million tonnes of carbon emission per year, of which the largest industries in the Cluster account for over 6 million tonnes.
As part of the government’s Industrial Decarbonisation Challenge, the Cluster has received UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) funding to prepare a plan for decarbonising our region’s industry and business.
The Net Zero North West Cluster Plan will create a deliverable investment, technology and infrastructure blueprint for the North West’s net zero transition and low carbon recovery post-COVID-19. It will recommend the technologies, infrastructure changes and investment necessary to transition the North West, working with North Wales, to net zero carbon by 2040.
The Cluster Plan is supported by Innovate UK and will inform UKRI and Government’s preparation of a national industrial cluster plan strategy, industrial decarbonisation strategy and other policy areas. The Cluster Plan aims to act as a roadmap to explain how
the North West can lead in:
- Establishing a low-carbon industrial cluster by 2030, by deploying anchor investment projects including HyNet North West’s (‘HyNet’) hydrogen and carbon capture utilisation and storage (CCUS) infrastructure
- Establishing a net zero carbon industrial cluster by 2040, underpinned by multi-vectored industrial decarbonisation solutions
The Cluster Plan is being developed by a consortium of organisations that are seeking to address the technical and economic questions raised by the imperative to remove carbon from industrial processes. Alongside public, private and academic institutions, the NZNW consortium includes representation from energy intensive industrial consumers based in the North West that recognise
the necessity to decarbonise.
Preparation of the Cluster Plan began in January 2021. This Interim Report summarises the progress made in the first year, and the findings of detailed research into options for decarbonising industry via the use of energy networks, dispatchable power generation, CCUS (direct capture of CO₂ ) and via CCUS enabled and electrolytic hydrogen. The full reports are available at
www.netzeronw.co.uk/net-zero-nw-cluster-plan/
Ged Barlow, Chief Executive of Net Zero North West: This is a landmark point in the development of the North West’s Cluster Plan. For the first time we have a clear and credible roadmap to reaching net zero in 2040. We’ve long had the ambition to be the first cluster to decarbonise and this report shows how we’ll get there. There are a plethora of low carbon projects already happening in the North West from renewables to nuclear and hydrogen to ammonia and all of these are going to be needed to reach net zero. This regional decarbonisation strategy will not only help the UK meet its net zero targets it will be crucial in giving us greater energy independence as set out in the Government’s Energy Security Strategy last week.