Member Article

Teesside leader seeks cluster collaboration in face of escalating carbon prices

Teesside business leader Neil Kenley, Director of Business Investment at Tees Valley Unlimited, has this week spoken of the need to drive forward industrial decarbonisation to create a sustainable and prosperous future for the UK.

Speaking alongside representatives of the Government and other industrial clusters at a meeting of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS), Neil reiterated Teesside Collective’s on the benefits of cluster collaboration in the sector.

East Coast clusters in Teesside, Grangemouth and Humberside are all looking at ways in which carbon usage, hydrogen production and other technologies, along with CCS, can be used to reduce still further carbon emissions from industrial processes that make a vital contribution to the wider UK economy. Linking clusters on the East Coast with shared infrastructure could significantly reduce individual costs.

With the Government’s competitive funding for CCS on power stations no longer available, the decarbonisation of energy-intensive industries is seen as crucial to maintaining momentum towards meeting the UK’s climate change targets and Paris commitments in a cost-effective way.

Neil said: “Our members in Teesside are facing ever more intense competition from overseas. And they are facing the prospect of escalating carbon prices and demand from customers for environmentally sustainable products.

“All of this points to the need to find ways of reducing industrial emissions or even transforming CO2 into useful materials in order to retain and attract internationally mobile investment and the associated job creation.”

Industries in Teesside employ in the region of 10,000 people and make a vital contribution to the wider UK economy. The area is responsible for 58% of the UK’s chemical industry. It produces polyester resin for 15 billion recyclable drinks bottles a year.

He added: “Looking up and down the East Coast, we have the same pressures, the same goals and the same opportunities as other clusters. Collaboration between Teesside, Grangemouth, Humberside and others has to be the way forward if we’re to succeed in a cost-effective way.”

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