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Climate change
Our action on climate across Belfast is propelled through partnership working and driven through the Belfast Agenda and Our Planet Board. Through this board, we currently tackle the goal of creating a climate resilient city with net zero emissions through three key themes:
There are cross cutting projects within Our Planet themes:
Completed in December 2024, the BTFAS helps Belfast manage tidal flood risks from climate change, providing enhanced protection for over 3,000 homes and businesses. The flood defences account for climate projections to 2080 and are designed for further adaptability. Integrated with the landscape, the scheme preserves the River Lagan as a vibrant, welcoming space for communities, visitors, and investors. It includes earth embankments, brick-clad reinforced concrete walls, floodgates, glass defences, and demountable barriers that blend with existing streetscapes.
This £33million investment by the Department for Infrastructure (DfI) better prepares Belfast for future tidal events, safeguarding people and infrastructure while promoting sustainability. The scheme features demountable and temporary defences to seal access points and roadways during alerts.
Post-completion, DfI is collaborating with multi-agency partners to update the Belfast Coastal Emergency Response Plan. Beyond flood protection, the scheme supports economic growth by securing homes, businesses, and infrastructure, attracting investment, and enhancing Belfast's reputation as a resilient city. It reduces economic and social impacts, with estimated flood damage avoidance benefits exceeding £168million over its design life (based on 2018 figures).
We commissioned several work streams linked to developing a low-carbon heat network within central Belfast. The Local Area Energy Plan evidence demonstrates that heat networks are one of the key projects to help Belfast progress towards net zero emissions.
Our progress and delivery highlights are:
Established in September 2022, the hub adopts a consortium approach to accelerate retrofit activity across public and private buildings. It engages stakeholders from the construction supply chain, funders, academics, public bodies, housing providers, and consumer groups, informed by the Construction Leadership Council's National Retrofit Strategy.
We launched the LAEP in September 2024. Led by local government and developed collaboratively with key stakeholders, this comprehensive roadmap outlines the best route for Belfast to transition to clean, renewable energy sources to help achieve the city’s target of net zero by 2050.
The plan incorporates the region’s unique characteristics including its geothermal resource as well as its biomethane and hydrogen potential. This will enable us to move towards a more circular economy that uses our local assets and resources instead of relying on imported fossil fuels for our energy needs.
The Belfast LAEP presents five priority projects:
By being data-driven, it provides an area with a level of detail equivalent to an outline masterplan, resulting in a fully costed, co-ordinated spatial and visual plan, identifying the change that is needed to the local energy system and the built environment.
The Belfast plan provides a strong evidence base that will underpin a series of net zero investments across the city. It demonstrates the collective intent of partners to decarbonise the city whilst also generating jobs and prosperity for people who live and work in Belfast. The Belfast LAEP is an exciting and crucial initiative for our city's sustainable future, with commitment and collaboration between the council, utilities, businesses, universities and residents, Belfast can become a model for clean energy adoption.
We launched a Net-Zero Carbon Roadmap for Belfast in December 2020. We developed this as a key partner of the Belfast Climate Commission partner through the Place Based Climate Action Network (PCAN). It is designed to influence the city’s net-zero plans and to inform how we can work to a target.
The roadmap identifies transport, buildings and industry as key sectors to decarbonise. The roadmap was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council. The project is led by Grantham Institute at LSE with the cities and universities of Leeds, Edinburgh and Belfast.
Belfast Harbour's integrated Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) strategy places human capital and sustainability at the heart of all activities and aligns with the Trust Port mandate to operate, maintain, and enhance the Belfast Harbour Estate.
In 2024, the harbour invested £325,000 in local communities and a further £3.6million was invested in City Quays Garden, a One Planet Living Public Space. The harbour achieved a 35 per cent reduction in Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions in 2024.
The Northern Ireland Housing Executive has been appointed to the External Advisory Board of the HEARTH Project (The National Hub on the Net Zero, Health and Extreme Heat).
This research project, led by Oxford Brookes University is examining how the transition to net zero emissions can benefit vulnerable populations by improving health outcomes, such as reducing heat-related illnesses and enhancing living conditions during extreme heat events over a five-year period from 2025 to 2030.
We collaborated with the Met Office to create heat packs for Belfast. This work addressed information gaps at city and subcity levels, using high-resolution climate projections for urban heat hazard estimates.
For more information on our projects, read The Belfast Agenda Statement of Progress 2023-2025 Theme four: Our planet or contact us [email protected].
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