Khan do: £1.5bn package to help London's green recovery

Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has announced a package of £1.5bn infrastructure investment to reduce the capital’s emissions, water leakage and pollution. Khan made the announcement on July 29th after the second meeting of the London Recovery Board, a panel drawn from all communities and industries across London to plan for the city’s future post-Covid.

The London Recovery Board will collaborate with the Infrastructure Coordination Service to establish the projects which will receive the funding. The projects fall within four groupings:

• An upgrade of security on Greater London’s gas network.

• A 20% reduction in water leakage and 30% reduction in pollution incidents by 2025.

• An increase in the resilience of the water supply networks across specific boroughs.

• Prepare the electricity infrastructure for the anticipated increase in usage of electric vehicles.

Utility companies will work in conjunction with City Hall on these projects and on efforts to identify environmentally beneficial schemes with an emphasis on creating new jobs to help the city’s recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic.

To further facilitate that recovery, the London Recovery Board is soliciting the views of people across the capital. It is undertaking a period of “consultation and conversation” with Londoners through their online forum with 50,000 people already registered.

The infrastructure investment announcement comes soon after the UK Government pledged £2bn to be spent on providing the means for more walking and cycling nationwide, a move approved by the mayor who has repeatedly encouraged those activities.

A week earlier, Sadiq Khan had set out plans to reboot the London housing sector in the wake of Covid-19 disruption. Fears among environmental groups that such plans would be to the detriment of the green economy will be alleviated by the £1.5bn infrastructure investment.

In May 2018, Khan unveiled the London Environment Strategy, a multi-faceted plan with the ultimate goal of making London “the world’s greenest global city” by 2050. In early 2020, Khan pledged to make London carbon-neutral by 2030 as part of his re-election manifesto