There are 14,000 full-time onshore jobs in the Scottish petro-chemical industry and supply chain. If Scotland was able to secure up to 40% of the UK’s carbon capture, utilisation and storage programme it would lead to the creation of a further 45,000 jobs by 2030. By 2050 up to 100,000 new jobs could be created in a transformed energy sector. Based on study by the Centre for Energy Policy University of Strathclyde
Crucially, though there are many hundreds of thousands of jobs that could also be safeguarded in carbon intensive industries across the UK if CO2 emissions can be mitigated at source. Again a full suite of carbon reduction technologies, including CCUS, Direct Air Capture and hydrogen will be required to make this a reality.
Many of Scotland’s academic institutions lead the way in the research and development of low carbon technologies. The UK’s industrial decarbonisation research and innovation centre is at Scotland’s Herriot Watt University, whilst the Universities of Edinburgh, Aberdeen, St Andrews, and Strathclyde all have centres of excellence.
Fossil fuels extracted in Scotland have helped fuel the UK economy since the industrial revolution. We are now on the verge of a new low-carbon energy revolution and once again Scotland front and centre of that transition by capitalising on the skills and know how of a committed workforce that have developed over decades.