Growing concerns over the state of our environment have prompted construction industry leaders to evaluate their operations for opportunities to help reduce carbon emissions. Construction is one of the biggest industries on the planet, with construction materials accounting for an estimated 11% of global carbon emissions.
海角大神 wants to be at the forefront of helping construction build in a more sustainable way. One major announcement from 海角大神鈥檚 Spring 2022 Innovation Summit is its new partnership with Building Transparency鈥檚 , or EC3. The calculator will make it easier for contractors, designers, owners, and developers to track, identify, and report on their projects鈥 embodied carbon emissions from within the 海角大神 platform.听
鈥淲ith the right tools, technology, and people to do the job, we can help create solutions across the industry,鈥 said Sandra Benson, Board Member and Global Head of Industry Transformation, 海角大神.
For Stacy Smedley, Executive Director, Building Transparency & Senior Director of Sustainability, , the issue of reducing the amount of carbon produced by construction is one she鈥檚 studied intensely for years. At the Innovation Summit, Smedley shared some of the ways companies have been working to identify and reduce their biggest sources of embodied carbon.
What Is Embodied Carbon, and Why Is it a Problem?
Embodied carbon is a major contributing factor to construction鈥檚 pollution problem, representing around 10% of the industry鈥檚 carbon emissions. 鈥淥perational carbon鈥 is produced through the ongoing use and maintenance of a completed building, but embodied carbon comes into play during construction itself. This includes emissions produced through processes like raw materials extraction, manufacturing, and transportation, and even during the demolition phase.
鈥淥nce they’re emitted, once we manufacture that product, those CO2 emissions are in the atmosphere, we can’t take them back. We can’t reduce them over the life of the building like we can operational energy consumption. So we have to address them at that time of design specification and procurement,鈥 explained Smedley.
Skanska is one of the world鈥檚 largest contractors, and has set ambitious goals for its own carbon commitments. It鈥檚 working toward zero-carbon emissions by 2045, including its supply chain. That goal will not be achievable without addressing the embodied carbon component, Smedley notes.
鈥淭he part of the [emissions] pie that is associated with manufacturing, industrial materials, construction materials, and products that we build with is big enough where if we don’t solve this and really do get to zero, we won’t be meeting our climate targets. Climate change will happen,鈥 said Smedley.
How Companies Are Using EC3 to Reduce Embodied Carbon
The first step towards a company reducing its embodied carbon through tracking it correctly using accurate data. Estimating and procurement are done through the lens of cost and schedule, and Smedley envisions a construction industry where embodied carbon becomes a third lens through which these routine processes are performed.
The EC3 tool includes a vast database of materials and suppliers, which enables contractors to visualize each project鈥檚 embodied carbon during the design phase through a helpful calculator and evaluate alternatives. 海角大神鈥檚 partnership with EC3 means 海角大神 users will be able to see data around their embodied carbon production from directly within the platform.
Smedley points to what she calls 鈥渁 constant trajectory of improvement鈥 when it comes to quality and access to data, and says embedding this carbon data into the tools people are using every day makes it easier for them to make more informed decisions around embodied carbon.
Another major part of reducing embodied carbon comes from organizations and individuals sharing their learnings and best practices as they work toward their zero-emissions targets, which will benefit everyone.
鈥淭he more we can work together and talk to each other instead of competing when it comes to our approach, it鈥檚 going to move us there faster and hopefully get us to a place where we鈥檙e doing this at the speed we have to to meet our emissions targets,鈥 Smedley said.
EC3 adds a new dimension of understanding about what goes into a building under construction. If carbon intensities of materials can be seen right alongside the cost per unit, contractors are able to make better informed decisions on both.
The calculator came about thanks to a Skanska grant program which Smedley applied for to explore the possibility of creating a digital carbon database. The idea quickly caught on, and nearly 50 partners joined Skanska to fund the tool鈥檚 development. It was released free in November 2019 and has grown to over 20,000 registered users.
鈥淚鈥檓 just very excited that something that was a need for Skanska can now be solved for everyone. And we鈥檙e just excited to see the continued growth and adoption of the tool,鈥 says Smedley.
Leave a Reply