Ben Rimmington is Director General, Net Zero Buildings and Industry at the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ). Ben’s Group is responsible for driving decarbonisation across the UK’s building stock and industry, which together are the direct source of over a third of the UK's emissions.

The portfolio of work includes delivery of capital programmes for retrofit projects totalling over £6bn across the current Spending Review, interventions to support the development of specific heat decarbonisation technologies, wide-ranging work on energy efficiency policy, the smart metering implementation programme and management and development of the UK emissions trading scheme. Ben’s responsibilities include fuel poverty strategy and he has in recent months also been leading a number of the Government’s interventions to address exceptional affordability issues for both domestic and non-domestic energy customers.

Ben moved to this role from the Department for Transport, where he most recently led on Brexit and Covid 19 response issues relating to road transport, from market access negotiations to delivery of emergency testing infrastructure for hauliers. Ben’s earlier career includes senior civil service roles dealing with a range of policies, including company law and corporate governance, business finance policy, EU employment law negotiations and management of the government’s relationship with the car industry. He is based in the DESNZ Salford office and lives in Ilkley, West Yorkshire.