I was very pleased to be asked to speak at the US Green Building Council (USGBC) Live event last month.
I was on a ‘meet the experts’ session alongside Ingemar Hunold, partner at European sustainability consultancy Envirosustain and Kay Killman, head of GBCI Europe.
The topic was looking at the schemes and technologies that will help a decarbonisation journey in the European Real Estate market.
This is a big topic to say the least – one that requires far more than a 30-minute discussion so we were only really able to touch on some of the issues and potential solutions.
But I thought Ingemar produced a very useful diagram outlining the steps in a journey to net-zero carbon (below). He made the point that most real estate organisations are still getting to grips with the first step on this path which is defining what is the current carbon footprint of a building or organisation.
This is still a challenge to work out what is being counted here – is it scope one and two or does it include some scope three which looks at tenant actions and supply chains? It takes quite a lot of time and knowledge to define this starting point for the decarbonisation journey,” he said.
Kay added that organisations often needed to consider whether they were counting embodied carbon as well in their calculations.
Ingemar said the second step on the journey must be energy efficiency and how to reduce demand.
“If we can do this at the start then we can design systems in these buildings that will not use too much energy.”
My task was to talk about NABERS UK and some of the drivers behind its introduction in the UK. This is of course the overwhelming evidence that Australia, where NABERS originated, is far better at producing and operating energy efficient buildings than the UK.
Part of the reason for this is because they put far more effort, skill and money into the use of energy modelling in Australia. The system incentivises designs that are accurate and realistic enough to deliver a projected NABERS star rating a year after operation.
The discussion also moved on to looking at energy supply as part of a decarbonisation journey and Ingemar added that there had been discussions as to whether the LEED Zero accreditation should provide credits for the electrification of buildings.
But electrifying existing buildings, as I pointed out, can sometimes be a steeper challenge than you might think.
Many existing buildings were built and designed with boilers in mind. Often the temperatures required in the existing system will exceed that which can be easily achieved with electrified systems such as heat-pumps. This is a real issue we are grappling with for our current clients at the moment as in the UK the national grid continues to decarbonise swiftly.
What was useful was hearing about the experience from across Europe and being able to share knowledge across different disciplines and countries. Sharing knowledge and experiences is the only way we will be able to accelerate our progress.
To find out more about how we can support you with your decarbonisation journey, please contact us. You can learn more about EVORA EDGE on their website.