Background to the report
Engineering must provide tools to help us meet the challenge of climate change.
Our leading position across power, transport, industry and community development gives Parsons Brinckerhoff a strong platform from which to explore the critical steps necessary to tackle the causes of climate change.
When we first examined the challenge carbon reduction posed to the UK and global economies, we recognised our unique ability to take a broad and informed view. PB works with companies in all the major CO2 emitting sectors and we felt our expertise would provide a valuable contribution to the debate on delivering solutions for a low-carbon future.
We set out to establish the effectiveness of a range of possible measures and consider what choices they would offer to meet the UK's 2050 commitments. While the potential cost of this is clearly important, we have used effectiveness rather than cost as our primary driver. From the outset we adopted an inherently cautious approach using 'conservative' assumptions over the technology, timing and scale of implementations. All the options we consider use technologies that are either currently established or close to large-scale application.
Our report divides the UK economy into five sectors - transport, domestic, industry, commercial and electricity. We reviewed the current energy consumption and CO2 emissions for each and have prepared a forecast for 2050. We have also developed a comprehensive set of analysis models to evaluate the overall impact of various measures - allowing alternative strategies to be compared and critical measures to be identified.
Our findings are based on government published statistics and all sources are referenced in the main document.
Parsons Brinckerhoff (PB) is a global leader in developing and operating infrastructure around the world, with around 13,000 employees dedicated to meeting the needs of clients and communities across Europe, Africa, the Americas, the Middle East, Asia and the Australia-Pacific region. Clients come to PB for a wide range of advice, skills and resources in strategic consulting, programme management, planning, engineering, construction management and operations. For over a century PB has earned a distinguished reputation for delivering world-class infrastructure and its technical expertise in transportation, power, community development, water and the environment.
Acknowledgements
Powering the Future was written by a multi-disciplinary team of specialist engineers at Parsons Brinckerhoff. The lead author was Paul Willson and his co-authors included Brian Betts, Richard Bolton, Adrian Davison, Phillip Lucy, Gavin Norris, John Sheppard and Harriet Windebank. Additionally, a further group of specialists across the company provided the authors with valuable information, advice and guidance. Editing and production was by Maria Laffey. The company would also like to thank its independent external reviewers who provided essential insight and perspective, adding immeasurably to the value and impact of the completed report.
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