New report calls for creation of a Midlands Healthcare Net Zero Accelerator to turn research and innovation into practical solutions for the NHS

The Midlands has the potential to become the UK’s leading demonstrator region for sustainable healthcare, according to a new report which sets out a practical roadmap for creating a lower-carbon, more resilient and future-ready health system.

Futureproofing Healthcare – Towards a low-carbon, sustainable and resilient healthcare system, produced by the Energy Research Accelerator (ERA) and Midlands Innovation Health (MI Health), with support from strategic consultancy Madano, argues that decarbonisation cannot be addressed in isolation from the wider challenges facing healthcare.

Climate change, energy security, ageing estates, pressure on NHS finances, supply-chain disruption and growing demand for care are interconnected challenges that require a coordinated, whole-system response.

The report draws on four stakeholder workshops involving senior representatives from the NHS and wider healthcare sector, alongside academics and researchers from universities across the Midlands. The workshops explored energy and decarbonisation; policy, data and system-level innovation; sustainable MedTech and advanced materials; and supply chains, circular economy and waste.

The report concludes that many of the technologies, research capabilities and examples of good practice needed to address these challenges already exist. The key challenge is connecting them to healthcare needs and creating the conditions in which successful innovations can be implemented and scaled.

Midlands Healthcare Net Zero Accelerator

At the heart of the report is a recommendation to establish a Midlands Healthcare Net Zero Accelerator. This is a regional delivery framework bringing together the NHS, universities, industry, local and regional government, funders and other partners.

Rather than creating another research centre, the Accelerator would connect existing expertise and initiatives around clearly defined healthcare challenges. It would support real-world demonstrator projects, coordinate funding and investment, help overcome procurement and implementation barriers and create a route through which successful regional innovations could influence national NHS policy, standards and procurement.

The report recommends that the first phase should move quickly from planning to delivery, with ERA and MI Health establishing a coalition of partners, selecting the first demonstrator projects and launching a minimum viable evidence platform within 12 months.

The report highlights the scale of the opportunity in a region serving around 11 million people, with 42 NHS trusts, 30 community diagnostic centres and almost 2,000 trust-reported sites. The Midlands also combines major strengths in energy systems, advanced manufacturing, medical technologies, materials science, data, supply chains, transport and clinical research.

Seven recommendations for action

The report sets out seven interconnected recommendations:

1. Adopt a collaborative whole-system view, considering estates, clinical pathways, community care, medicines, devices, digital infrastructure, transport, procurement and waste together.
2. Create data that is robust enough to act upon, connecting existing information to provide decision-ready evidence for NHS organisations rather than creating additional reporting burdens.
3. Reduce avoidable demand before major capital investment, from improving building controls, metering and maintenance to preventing waste, optimising medicines and supporting prevention and appropriate care closer to home.
4. Plan healthcare as part of place-based energy and climate resilience, recognising hospitals and community healthcare facilities as critical local infrastructure.
5. Use procurement and circularity to shape markets, moving beyond upfront purchase price towards whole-life value, including carbon, durability, repair, reuse, resilience and end-of-life treatment.
6. Build implementation capability, skills and behaviour change, ensuring sustainability is embedded within clinical practice, estates, procurement, finance, digital services, leadership and professional education.
7. Establish the Midlands Healthcare Net Zero Accelerator to connect these activities and create a pathway from regional demonstration to national adoption.

Potential demonstrator projects identified in the report include place-based energy and resilience around major healthcare sites; circular MedTech and reverse logistics; digital twins and intelligent estates; whole-life procurement; and sustainable community care and transport.

The report also identifies an important economic opportunity for the Midlands. The region has close to 800 MedTech businesses, employing almost 30,000 people and generating an estimated £6.9 billion in turnover. Connecting NHS sustainability challenges with the region’s research and manufacturing capabilities could therefore support innovation, SME growth and the development of new products and services as well as improving healthcare.

Dr Helen Turner, Director of Midlands Innovation, said:

“The Midlands brings together significant healthcare expertise and strong research and innovation capabilities across the health and energy sectors. Our universities have a well-established track record of collaborating on research, sharing expertise and turning ideas into practical solutions. This report sets out how we can build on that foundation to help make healthcare more resilient, productive and sustainable, while improving outcomes for patients.

“The proposed Midlands Healthcare Net Zero Accelerator would connect individual projects into a coordinated programme, helping to demonstrate solutions at scale and build the evidence needed to support wider adoption across the NHS.”

Professor Mike Lewis, NIHR Scientific Director for Innovation and Professor of Life Science Innovation at the University of Birmingham, commented:

“Excellent research and innovation is taking place throughout the UK across our universities, the NHS and industry. The challenge is turning the best ideas into solutions that can be adopted in everyday healthcare.

“The Midlands has the scale and expertise to provide a powerful testbed, bringing researchers, clinicians, industry and policymakers together to develop and demonstrate solutions that would ultimately benefit patients and healthcare systems across the UK. Even though our region is home to the UK’s second city it shouldn’t mean second class investment in innovation.”

The report calls on national policymakers and funders to support the development of the programme and help create routes through which successful Midlands demonstrators can be replicated across the NHS.

Its ambition is for the Midlands to provide a model for how academia, industry, healthcare and regional government can work together to tackle one of the NHS’s most complex long-term challenges – improving care, productivity and resilience while reducing carbon and material demand.

The Futureproofing Healthcare report can be downloaded here.

For more information please contact either Nick King at the Energy Research Accelerator or Alex Archibald at Midlands Innovation Health.

ENDS

Notes to editors

About the report

Futureproofing Healthcare – Towards a low-carbon, sustainable and resilient healthcare system was produced by the Energy Research Accelerator (ERA) and Midlands Innovation Health (MI Health), with support from Madano.

The report was informed by four online stakeholder workshops held in May 2026, involving senior representatives from the NHS and wider healthcare sector alongside academics and researchers from Midlands Innovation universities and partner research institutes. The findings and recommendations were subsequently reviewed and endorsed by ERA and MI Health.

About the Energy Research Accelerator

The Energy Research Accelerator (ERA) is a partnership of eight Midlands universities and the British Geological Survey, working with industry and government to accelerate research, innovation and skills across the energy sector. Its university partners are Aston, Birmingham, Cranfield, Keele, Leicester, Loughborough, Nottingham and Warwick.

About Midlands Innovation Health

Midlands Innovation Health brings together the collective research and innovation strengths of seven Midlands universities – Aston, Birmingham, Keele, Leicester, Loughborough, Nottingham and Warwick – working across academia, the NHS and industry to address health challenges and support regional growth.