2. The business case

When senior leaders in the Ministry of Defence said the organisation was exempt from the government’s mandate to reach net zero by 2050, that could have been the end of the story. However, Lieutenant General Richard Nugee CB CVO CBE, former climate change and sustainability strategy lead for Ministry of Defence, decided that it didn’t have to be the outcome if he could present the business case correctly.

Despite initial resistance to Richard’s report on decarbonising the MoD, it has now been accepted and is being used as a model for other defence organisations around the world, as well as being the basis for NATO’s Climate Change and Security Action Plan. According to Richard, the key to the change in attitude was presenting the business case in the right way. He added that this is essential for the wider construction industry to also understand and act on.

In underlining that delivering net zero does not have to mean increased cost or reduced efficiency, Richard said that there was a need for carbon reduction in defence to also deliver broader improvements.

Cost and capability

“I focused on things that really interest defence,” he explained. “The first is greater capability – being better at what we do. Being the best Army, Navy and Air Force in the world. But how does climate change affect our ability to do that?

“We can be the greenest Army, Navy and Air Force in the world but if we come second in a war as a result, we come second in a war. We are paid to win, we are paid to come first, we are paid to protect you. The point is that we can’t be green and less effective, you’ve got to be green and more effective.

[The investment] was about resilience

“The second thing I concentrated on was that Defence, like every other government department, is interested in saving money.

“I had to put the whole of my climate plan into those two simple contexts – how do I save money and how do I make us more effective. And then I needed to consider who I had to persuade. It wasn’t the chief of defence staff or the ministers, it was the finance director that I needed to focus on.”

Selling solar example

As an example of presenting the business case in the right way, Richard pointed to a plan to build solar farms on the MoD’s estate. “When the finance director asked why, the response was that it would save lots of emissions but his answer was ‘that is not our job’,” explained Richard. “The project received no funding, not even for a pilot project.”

Richard urged the team working on the initiative not to give up but to approach the question differently. “The team went back to the finance director and presented the case that government has predicted that we will run out of electricity by 2035 and the army running out of electricity would be a bit embarrassing,” he said. “[The investment] was about resilience. The second reason presented was that it would also save money. There is an accepted upfront cost but it will save money in the long run and it got funding.”

Use a sustainability lens in everything you look at

As another example of carbon efficiency also improving the MoD operationally, Richard explained the benefits of using electric drives on tanks. He said that it wasn’t possible to make an electric tank, but by adding an electric drive powered by a diesel engine, the tanks are now more manoeuvrable and can also operate in a silent mode. “No emissions, no noise, no heat signature, so it is better tactically, as well as environmentally,” he added.

His key advice to the construction sector when it comes to delivering net zero is to work within the grain of an organisation and challenge the normal approach, identify quick wins and use a sustainability lens in everything you look at.