Cleaner dumps Hirst installation

Hirst's installation has been recreated by the gallery

Conceptual artist Damien Hirst has announced the creation of a giant work to publicise the issue of green house gases in the atmosphere.

The artists will represent the amount of carbon dioxide he generates in year - around 15 tonnes - by arranging 441 empty gas canisters in a block.

The canisters, each of which is 6ft tall and formerly contained carbon dioxide, are arranged 24 mesh cages with an empty square at the centre.

Hirst, who has worked with environmental group Future Forests in recent years, said: "I just like the idea of being able to put something back."

"It just seems to be very direct and really straight forward, without being hippified.

"I was doing some work using gas cylinders and I started thinking about how much space that stuff filled.

"Then I thought it would be great to make something which actually physically shows your carbon dioxide emissions - otherwise it's just a figure on paper," said Hirst.

Future Forest's co-founder Dan Morrell said the support of the high-profile artist was important

"Pop culture has a huge communication capacity and Damien's ideas, along with those from the music community, have encouraged environmentalism in big corporations and government.

"Global warming is one of the biggest issues facing us and we can all be empowered to do something about it by switching to renewable energy, creating less CO2 through efficiency and planting beautiful forests to offset the balance."

But Future Forests said no decision had been made on where Hirst's new work would be exhibited.