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GLASGOW is to bring forward plans for its own green funding model in a bid to secure ‘massive’ investment in a climate resilient future, the city’s council has announced.
The city is to target partnerships capable of delivering large-scale interventions in everything from energy systems and transport to buildings and biodiversity.
Speaking at the 25th annual State of the City Economy Conference, Glasgow City Council leader Susan Aitken said detailed plans would be published and go before committee for approval early in the new year.
Glasgow’s bid for green investment comes after a period in which the city has already attracted more than £300 million in additional public cash – and will learn from successful work carried out in Bristol; where a ‘ground breaking’ investment mechanism is expected to generate around £1 billion to increase the scale and pace of investment in low carbon energy infrastructure.
Councillor Aitken said, “This milestone State of the City Economy event has afforded us an opportunity to look back at the progress we’ve made, take stock of where we are and continue laying the foundations for the future. These are hugely challenging times economically and socially for cities across the UK. But the building blocks we’ve put in place in Glasgow in recent years are now bearing fruit.
“In just over a year we’ve secured £300 million in public investment to advance cutting-edge new sectors; work on the transformational Clyde Metro project today takes its most significant step forward to date, and we’re announcing a huge advance in delivering the multi-million investment needed for Glasgow’s transition to net zero.”
Addressing her 6th SOCE event, councillor Aitken gave a key update on Clyde Metro – a project kick-started at the same conference in 2017. On that occasion, councillor Aitken announced the council would fund an independent connectivity commission tasked with rethinking how the city moves.
The commissioners’ headline recommendation was a regional metro system – including key links between Glasgow city centre and destinations including Glasgow Airport, the Advanced Manufacturing Innovation District and the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital.
With the scheme now recognised by ministers as a national priority and hailed as the ‘most significant investment in Scotland’s infrastructure in decades’, councillor Aitken confirmed Clyde Metro is ‘moving at pace’ to the next phase of its delivery, which will see the preparation of a detailed business case.
