The Green Piece
How Leicestershire’s universities are aiding our bid to go green and how one bright spark suggests that money can be made from an eco-friendly investment WORDS BY AIMEE CULVERHOUSE AND EMILY MILLER
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his issue, The Green Piece looks into how universities can help the people and businesses of Leicestershire to go green, and how those individuals and organisations can then benefit financially from making one rather specific investment. What are Leicestershire’s universities doing to help us go green? Government funding worth £1m has been awarded to support Leicestershire companies in the race to net zero. Delivered by De Montfort University, University of Leicester, and Loughborough University alongside
local authorities and the city’s business support organisations, is The East Midlands Accelerator programme, led by East Midlands Chamber. The programme is for companies that have between 10 and 250 employees based in Leicestershire, enabling them to receive free help to discover their carbon footprint and put together practical steps to reduce emissions. Dr Andrew Reeves, Associate Professor in Energy and Sustainable Development at DMU, will be working with companies on the accelerator programme. He said: “We know from recent work we have done alongside the University of Leicester that while many companies want to do more to cut their carbon emission, they are not sure about what steps they can take to become more sustainable. “We hope that by combining all of our expertise, we can support them to take practical steps and have a plan in place which is achievable and could help to ‘green’ the whole of the city’s business eco-system.” The zero-carbon project is just one of five programmes that will be funded via the £1m pot, which comes from the Government’s UK Community Renewal Fund (CRF). Others focus on startups, mentoring, finance, and digital transformation. SMEs can express interest in taking part in the programme by emailing Leicester Innovation Hub on leicinnovation@le.ac.uk.
