As part of the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund project, members of the ECEHH are collaborating with a local company to estimate the economic and environmental impacts of a new technology.

SageTech is high-tech start-up based in Devon which has developed a state-of-the-art techniques to capture and recycle anesthetic gases.

We are working with SageTech and local NHS hospital trusts to apply life-cycle assessments and input-output models to the assessment of this exciting technology.

The UK Government has set ambitious targets for carbon reduction through the Greening Government Commitment (GGC), the Climate Change Act (2008) and Carbon Budgets. The Climate Change Act (2008) was introduced to ensure the UK cuts its absolute carbon emissions by 80% of 1990 levels by 2050. This plan brings together practitioners, entrepreneurs, academics, and policymakers and encourages cutting-edge innovations to support the GGC on carbon reduction.

The NHS spends between £50-60 million on inhalational anaesthetic gases per year, approximately 98% of these gases are vented to the atmosphere. The inhalational anaesthetic agent’s sevoflurane, isoflurane and desflurane have global warming potentials of 2-3 orders of magnitude higher than carbon dioxide.