Climate Change Progress

Carbon emissions from Dundee City Council’s operations have been cut by more than 10% in the past 12 months, and almost 50% in 14 years, according to a new report.

Councillors will be told that the council’s response to the climate emergency has also included the announcement of £21m of capital investment in green recovery projects to cut greenhouse gas emissions and to support other climate positive projects.

John Alexander convener of Dundee City Council’s policy and resources committee said: “The way councils operate and deliver services means they have an important role to play in climate change, everything from thinking about emissions from our fleet and buildings to the way we deal with our waste and green spaces has an impact.

“By leading the way through bold and ambitious initiatives such as the low emission zone, we are setting a benchmark that we hope others will follow, and by working together with the private sector across the city we can all adopt more sustainable practices.

“Of course, there is still more we can and will do to tackle climate change, one of the biggest issues facing us all, but we are committed to making a real difference right now and in the future.”

The council has already declared a climate emergency and a Dundee Climate Leadership Group has been established to help achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions for the city in the next 25 years.

It has invested around £60 million over the last three years to tackle climate change and additional projects will bring the total to almost £115m by 2026.

The figures are revealed in the latest public bodies climate change duties report, covering 2020/21 which will be discussed by the council’s policy and resources committee on Monday (November 22).

It notes that as well as reducing the council’s carbon footprint by 11% in the past year, it has come down by 49% since the baseline year of 2007/08.

Energy consumption and carbon emissions have also gone down and while the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in building closures for much of the year and the initial months saw large cuts in both electricity and gas consumption, the situation was reversed when COVID-19 risk mitigation recommendations were implemented and ventilation systems were set up to run 24/7 in all buildings.

Other highlights included street lighting electricity consumption being reduced by 25% as a result of the LED street lamp replacement and approximately 245,700 KWh of electricity being generated from the council’s solar phot-voltaic systems. 

Dundee City Council

Dundee draws skilled workers from a 60-minute catchment population of 640,000 and has a local population of over 140,000. The availability of a large pool of highly skilled labour is a key feature in the Dundee economy. Flexibility in the labour force is currently more prevalent in Dundee than in Scotland as a whole. All forms of labour market flexibility - part-time, temporary employment, self-employment and shift work - are widely operational within the city. Labour force stability in the city is excellent, enabling companies to plan with confidence. Labour turnover levels are less than 5% and absenteeism averages 2%.

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