Yet many carbon plans remain detached from investment decisions. While sustainability roadmaps stretch to 2050, finance and asset teams work on annual cycles. Carbon strategies often feel like technical add-ons, not commercial drivers, and it is therefore no surprise that 24% of stakeholders cite silos as a major ESG obstacle. This results in reports that sit on shelves, while portfolios drift toward stranding risk.

Importance of integration

When carbon strategy sits at the heart of investment, acquisition, refurbishment, and disposal, decarbonisation becomes a strategic lever, not just compliance. Achieving this requires strong data infrastructure. While data is abundant, actionable insight is scarce. New sustainability tools are starting to close that gap, providing carbon intelligence at the right point in the investment cycle. Without it, even good plans risk drifting from operational reality. Those who succeed will be those who embed decarbonisation into how they manage, value and invest in assets.

Shifting our approach to carbon:

• Collective responsibility: Instead of treating decarbonisation as a niche responsibility, it must be co-owned by sustainability, investment and asset teams.

• Importance of carbon: Carbon should be considered alongside key measurable traditional metrics such as risk, lease length, rental performance, and yield. This applies whether you're acquiring, refurbishing, or disposing of an asset.

• Timing is crucial: Decarbonisation doesn’t always require new capital, it often requires smarter timing. By mapping interventions to existing lifecycle events, sustainability upgrades can be aligned with planned works such as tenant turnover, compliance upgrades or end-of-life equipment replacement. This reframes decarbonisation as a sequencing challenge, rather than an cost burden.

• Clear paths to action: High-level strategies are important, but they need to translate into tangible steps. Grouping assets into clear categories helps teams focus resources where they’ll have the greatest impact. While groupings often fall into prioritise, hold, or dispose, they can be more flexible. Categories can reflect timing, intervention type, and strategic context, capturing the real-world complexity of asset decisions. For example:

1. Prioritise interventions for prime assets with expected high ROI potential.
2. Hold assets that have long-term strategic value with deferred interventions planned such as targeting upgrades by 2030 to align with broader portfolio goals.
3. Disposing, as a last resort, of assets with limited value-add; responsible disposal frees up capital for higher-performing assets. 

This approach can unlock real value; when sustainability improvements are aligned with planned works, capital is used more efficiently and returns are increased. It also helps keep assets compliant with, or ahead of regulation, reducing risk and avoiding obsolescence. This protects long-term income and liquidity, while energy-efficient buildings continue to save money through reduced running costs.

The approach in practice:

In a portfolio of nearly 2,000 units, Savills teams built a costed decarbonisation roadmap directly into a five-year investment plan. Prime assets were prioritised for early wins, vacant units targeted to reduce holding costs, and interventions aligned with budget cycles. Carbon data informed hold/sell decisions and assets were grouped into action categories. 

The resulted in a commercially grounded plan, not just a sustainability strategy. It showed clear potential, £7.9 million in anticipated yearly operating cost savings from reduced vacancies, and £112 million in cumulative energy savings projected by 2040. Without integrating decarbonisation into the investment plan, and aligning the investment plan with decarbonisation goals, these savings would have remained theoretical.

Decarbonisation isn’t just about protecting long-term value, it’s about making smarter investment decisions today. If it’s not in your investment model, it’s not in your future.

Further information

Contact Eve Farrugia or Max Rushent