Let's Get Ready to Build a More Sustainable City

At our heart, we see the commercial built environment as a canvas where everyone can shape the future of sustainability and play a vital role in creating low-carbon office spaces across Central London.

We invite all Londoners—from developers and suppliers, to the next generation of professionals—to engage with us. Our Hub highlights the top recruitment, upskilling, reskilling, and diversity programmes available to you, designed to empower both current and aspiring workers in the city.
Skyline Skills Hub - Preparing people to build a more sustainable city

Join us as we work together to build a greener, more sustainable London!

The Skyline Skills Hub is aimed at the four groups of people who we believe have the biggest role to play in using their skills to green the built environment.
For business leaders, building owners, and contractors who are interested in adopting and integrating green practices into their daily operations.
For employees, supply chain, career changers, job seekers, and sole traders looking to develop green skills and pursue sustainable careers.
For young Londoners, career switchers, career advisers, teachers, and parents who are guiding the next generation towards careers.
For local authorities, government departments, philanthropic organisations, and training providers shaping sustainable policies.

Begin exploring the main ideas that drive our industry, enhancing your knowledge and expertise as you navigate through our Hub

Built Environment

The built environment includes all human-made structures and spaces, such as residential, commercial, industrial buildings, infrastructure, public spaces, transportation networks, and utilities.

These vary from person to person but, fundamentally, we mean the core skills needed to deliver action. These range from technical skills such as renewable energy procurement and assessing embodied carbon projects, to soft skills like advocating for sustainability throughout the supply chain and the key leadership skills needed to drive change and embed sustainability in organisations.
Worldwide, buildings are responsible for around 40% of energy and process-related CO2 emissions, 50% of all extracted materials, 33% of water consumption and 35% of generated waste. Other environmental impacts include resource depletion; air, water and land pollution and biodiversity loss.

By 2050, the global population will increase by 27% to 9.8 billion. By 2060 the global building floor area is expected to double, catapulting all environmental, social and economic impacts associated with the built environment. With this in mind, a green built environment protects and enhances people, places and the natural environment, and is critical to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and tackling the climate crisis.

Environmental priorities are balanced alongside socio-economic development, including economic growth, human health and equity. This holistic approach to sustainable development should be applied throughout the entire lifecycle of a building — from material sourcing, to design, construction, operation and end of life.
The commercial built environment includes London’s office buildings where people work.

Why focus on green built environment skills?

26,000

Over 26,000 extra construction workers are needed in Greater London by 2026.

100,000

The UK is anticipating that over 100,000 people will need to be recruited and upskilled to carry out the work required.

CO2

76%

In London, buildings contribute 76% of greenhouse gas emissions. 95% of emissions over the next 30 years come from existing buildings.

10%

By 2050, 10% of London’s jobs will be green, but the workforce is not growing fast enough to meet the demand for these roles.

CV

90%

Skyline Taskforce member and over 90% of industry respondents agree there is a major skills gap in green jobs for meeting net zero targets.

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Who are the people behind the Skyline Skills Hub

Who are Skyline Skills Hub
The Skyline Skills Hub was founded by the Skills for a Sustainable Skyline Taskforce, a collaboration of over 350 organisations from across the built environment.
Our mission is to boost the supply of green skilled workers for Central London’s sustainable commercial buildings.
The Skyline Skills Hub is run by industry experts who continually review and update the Hub so that our messages and resources remain fresh and relevant.
We believe that, through collaboration, we can drive the green skills agenda to ensure that London has a skilled and diverse workforce, equipped and empowered to build and maintain sustainable office buildings.

Testimonials

Impact of Green Skills and Sustainability

Discover how individuals and organisations are embracing the green skills and sustainability revolution. Hear first-hand how green skills initiatives are transforming careers and contributing to a greener built environment. These stories highlight the real-world impact of our efforts and inspire others to join us on the journey towards a sustainable future.

General resources

What does existing best practice look like for green skills across Central London’s commercial built environment?

Whether you’re an experienced professional in the built environment, a school leaver, a career switcher or a guardian of a young person looking for a potential career, organisations across the sector are already running a huge range of green skills programmes and initiatives.
You can find a tailored selection of best practice resources and existing opportunities in each section of the Hub.
Resources-General resources
Small Business Research + Enterprise Centre
Welcome to the Small Business Research and Enterprise Centre (SBREC). We are the City of...
Heart of the City
Heart of the City makes it easy for leaders to kickstart their responsible and sustainable...
Green Workx
Greenworkx empowers job seekers with the essential skills for green careers and connect employers with...
Energy Lab Consulting
Energylab are an energy and building services engineering consultancy, delivering efficient and flexible environments which...
jargon

Decoding the jargon: explore our glossary to understand key terms

A low carbon, or decarbonised economy, is an economy that causes low levels of greenhouse gas emissions, particularly when compared with our current economy which emits high levels of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. A low carbon economy is one that has decoupled delivery of goods and services from the burning of fossil fuels.  
Everything that we need for our survival and well-being depends, either directly or indirectly, on our natural environment. To pursue sustainability is to create and maintain the conditions under which humans and nature can exist in productive harmony to support present and future generations.
United Nations Sustainable Development Goals: organisations all over the world are using them as an easily understood and communicable framework and are adopting their own objectives and targets aligned with the themes of the SDGs. The 17 SDGs provide a shared blueprint for peace and prosperity for people and the planet, now and into the future, as well as an approach for organisations and governments to frame sustainability issues.
A zero-carbon economy is one where emissions from the commercial and industrial sector are reduced to zero while the economy thrives.
Whole Life Carbon emissions are the sum total of all the associated GHG emissions and removals, for the embodied, operational and disposal of a product through its whole life cycle.