The NHS is responsible for one in twenty of all UK carbon emissions, and this hub aims to cut that by redesigning how care is commissioned and delivered. This matters because healthcare’s carbon footprint is large and growing, yet most efforts to reduce it focus on individual actions rather than the systems that drive waste. The researchers will target the entire care pathway—from unnecessary appointments and unused medicines to single-use medical equipment—and measure both financial and carbon costs of changes. If successful, the hub could transform NHS procurement and clinical practice. It would develop tools to eliminate wasteful investigations, shift to remote consultations where safe, and create a circular economy for medical products—reusing equipment rather than discarding it. The team will also track health inequalities to ensure greener care does not disadvantage any patient group. The ultimate goal is a low-carbon NHS that serves as a model for other health systems worldwide.
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The NHS is reposible for one in twenty of all carbon emmissions in the UK. Care pathways (the way that care is delivered) contribute much to this carbon. Approaches to reduce carbon of care pathways including reducing unnecessary appointments, or exploring remote consultation where clinically appropriate. We can also reduce what is used, by eliminating unnecessary investigations, reducing wasted medicines, and maximising reuse or medical equipment where clinically safe to do so. We will explore a number of policy mechanisms to support such change, developed by an expert academic team from multiple Universities and with wide areas of expertise, co-created with relevant stakeholders from government, regulatory bodies and industry, alongside patients and the public. We will develop the approaches and tools to support change, and continually develop these to make them better. We will look at both the way that healthcare is commissioned (how we buy goods and service for the NHS, including digital health, pharmaceutical waste, and a circular economy for medical products), and (working with clinical teams) the way that it is delivered. We will measure the financial and carbon costs of proposed changes, as well as any benefits or trade-offs to health, particularly for health inequality, to make sure that as the NHS becomes greener it does not disadvantage any patient groups. Our vision is to create a world-leading international hub to support the NHS to become a low carbon provider of healthcare, that will serve as a model to other health systems.
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