The Clean Air Dividend of Net Zero

Air pollution remains one of the UK’s most significant environmental health risks, contributing to premature mortality, chronic illness and wider economic costs through reduced productivity, pressure on healthcare systems and poorer quality of life. The UK’s transition to net zero will fundamentally reshape the major sources of those emissions, across transport, buildings, industry and power generation. But the full value of that transition is not always fully reflected in the analysis that informs policy and investment decisions.

This study, commissioned by the Clean Air Fund and produced by CBI Economics and WSP, sets out to change that. It quantifies the air quality co-benefits of decarbonisation pathways aligned with the UK Climate Change Committee’s Balanced Pathway, examining how falling emissions reduce population exposure to harmful pollutants and translating those improvements into measurable health and economic outcomes.

The findings make a compelling case. Climate and clean air policy in most cases are mutually reinforcing, that is, the same measures that cut greenhouse gas emissions also reduce exposure to nitrogen dioxide and fine particulate matter, generating substantial and long-lasting gains for public health, workforce productivity and local communities.

Moreover, cleaner air is not a secondary benefit of net zero delivery. It is one of its most significant and immediate dividends. The report finds that decarbonisation across transport, buildings, industry and power generation will bring substantial air quality gains. This will deliver major health and economic value by 2050, including:

• Almost 500,000 avoided hospital admissions from respiratory and cardiovascular conditions – easing NHS pressure and saving taxpayer money.
• 38 million additional working days – equivalent to around 168,000 full-time working years returned to the UK economy.
• 264,000 avoided premature deaths – a number of lives equivalent to the population of a city roughly the size of Newcastle upon Tyne.