Just one per cent of UK businesses know their carbon footprint, according to new survey of 700 senior business executives released today by the Carbon Trust.

The study found that despite growing concerns over global warming with over a quarter of respondents claming their firm had been directly affected by climate change just a fraction of firms had measured their carbon output.

Tom Delay, chief executive of the Carbon Trust said that carbon footprinting was a key first step in any carbon reduction strategy that helped companies " better understand where carbon reductions can be made and cost savings achieved ".

The Carbon Trust urged more firms to undertake carbon footprint assessments, adding that it now offered free onsite emissions assessments for firms with energy bills of less than £3m a year a free emissions assessment.

The survey also revealed a polarisation in the adoption of carbon strategies between large and small firms. In contrast to the one per cent of firms measuring their carbon emissions almost half of FTSE listed companies had undertaken a carbon footprint assessment. Meanwhile, two thirds of FTSE firms now had a carbon reduction policy in place, compared to just a third of businesses throughout the UK.

Larger firms are also more upbeat about climate change with 60 per cent of FTSE firms identifying opportunities associated with climate change compared with just a quarter of businesses overall.

Delay added that the bulk of the carbon reduction policies now in place had been adopted in the last two years. "This is very encouraging, and shows UK business is on the move on climate change," he said. "Larger businesses in particular are beginning to understand the opportunities climate change presents and are working out how best to exploit them."

However, the survey results may well be seized on by critics of the Carbon Trust as further evidence that the organisation is making slow progress in addressing carbon emissions, particularly amongst smaller firms. Only last month a National Audit Office report found that while the Carbon Trust was on track to meet its emission reduction targets it had still only worked with 12 per cent of large businesses.

It also revealed that where firms had engaged with the Carbon Trust only 40 per cent of its recommendations were acted upon.