Cold economy could generate billions for UK economy

A new report from Birmingham University has highlighted the energy efficiency and decarbonisation benefits being missed by a failure to enable the “cold economy”.

The report, Doing Cold Smarter which was released today, follows on from Birmingham University’s Commission on Cold which began in March this year.

It issues a range of recommendations for raising awareness about the importance of cooling, which is used in commercial refrigeration, data centres, healthcare homes and other applications, both to the UK and global economy.

According to the report around 16 per cent of UK generating capacity is used “to keep our offices, food, cars, medicines, homes and scientific instruments cool. Globally, it is thought that refrigeration and air conditioning accounts for around 10 per cent of carbon dioxide emissions – three times more than is attributed to aviation and shipping combined.

Despite this, said Lord Robin Teverson who chaired the Commission on Cold, “Having spoken on energy issues in Parliament for seven years I cannot remember one debate, or one piece of legislation that has tackled this growing use of our energy.”

To change this, Doing Cold smarter recommends that government make a clear show of commitment to the adoption of clean cold technologies, that a technology innovation needs assessment is conducted for clean cold technologies and that a full system level model of UK cold usage is developed.

It also recommends that new support be made available to smart cold demonstration projects and new ways of measuring and managing the use of cold.

By showing this support and investing in clean cold technology, the report claims that the UK could seize a multi-billion pound opportunity to lead a global cold economy.

The report estimates that the global market value for clean cold technology solutions could be as high as £112 billion and that this is growing.

Nick Winser, chair of the Energy Systems Catapult who was closely involved in the Commission on Cold also emphasized that activing on the report’s recommendations and accelerating the findings of academic research into industrial application will be vital in meeting the UK’s carbon commitments targets.

“The UK’s climate change targets are rightly very ambitious – reducing carbon emissions by 80 per cent by 2050,” he said. “This means that every part of the energy system has to be addressed, we simply can’t afford to have any passengers.” 

See Nick Winser’s blog on the cold economy here.