There are already over 2 million existing commercial buildings in the UK, and over 22 million dwellings, in England alone - of which 60% were built before 1965.

The Climate Change Act 2008 establishes the goal of an 80% reduction in carbon emissions by 2050, and it is estimated that between 40% and 50% of carbon emissions are due to buildings.

In England, Building Regulations, the Code for Sustainable Homes, and the possibility of a Code for Sustainable Commercial Buildings, continue to increase the pressure on developers to achieve ever-higher standards of energy efficiency.  The target is for all new dwellings to be carbon-neutral in operation by 2016.

But the marginal cost (per tonne of carbon abated) of increasing energy efficiency in new buildings is high - higher than the cost of retrofitting existing buildings.  localCarbon introduces private investment and redirects that money spent from new buildings to the leakiest, poorest building stock, alleviating the major problem of fuel poverty and delivering greater carbon savings than would have been achieved in new buildings alone.

Click here to see an outline of how localCarbon financing works.