Our Climate Emergency declaration

In 2019 Lewisham was one of the first local authorities in London to declare a ‘climate emergency’.

Since then, Lewisham Council also signed up to the UK100 Net Zero Local Leadership Pledge, alongside over 40 other local leaders, to reach zero carbon before national government.   

We are clear that action on climate change is action to support the most vulnerable in our communities. Doing nothing risks costs that will be impossible to meet. The public sector must stand up for those least able to protect themselves and Lewisham’s Climate Emergency Action Plan seeks to place social justice at its centre.

Read more about our progress.

Climate Emergency Action Plan 

Our Climate Emergency Strategic Action Plan was initially agreed by Mayor and Cabinet on 11 March 2020 and refreshed on 14 March 2024. Our refreshed strategic plan for action reflects the scale and urgency of meeting the ambition for Lewisham to be net zero carbon by 2030. 

Strategy summary 

The strategy breaks down actions into five priority sections:  

Leading by example

We’ll put climate action at the heart of our work by decarbonising Council buildings, schools and our fleet of council vehicles. This is done in several ways, such as:

• removing gas boilers
• introducing heat pumps
• installing solar panels
• improving insulation and lighting
• measuring and reporting on carbon emissions

Sustainable housing 

We’ll work towards decarbonising our Council housing stock, give practical help to residents struggling to heat their homes, improve the quality of privately rented housing, and secure investment in low carbon energy infrastructure. 

Decarbonised transport

We’ll minimise the need for cars and other vehicles driving in and through the borough by creating better alternatives, such as improved provision for walking, cycling and public transport. We'll also seek to improve electric and sustainable transport networks and infrastructure. 

Greener adaptive Lewisham

Together with partners, we’ll adapt and make changes to enable us to deal with some of the impacts of climate change, for example by reducing flood risks and making the borough a greener place to live.

Each section of the strategy looks at action that the council has already taken, future plans as well as our asks of other actors, such as national government. 

• see a full list of actions in our refreshed Action Plan 2024    

Actions and reviews

Read Annexes A and B:

• Annex A: Communications Strategy 
• Annex B: Carbon Offset Fund

You can see progress on our actions in the below updates: 

• Action Plan progress 2020/21  
• Action Plan progress 2021/22  
• Action Plan progress 2022/23  

Our Executive Management Team will annually review our progress on the Climate Emergency Action Plan through our scrutiny committee process and report back to Mayor and Cabinet. 

We’ll also publish a public update once a year setting out what has been done in that year and updating our set of actions going forward.