UN report urges ‘massive emission cuts in construction sector’ by using ‘gov’t regs & enforcement’ to achieve ‘Net Zero’ – Replace ‘concrete & steel’ with ‘stone, timber, & bamboo’
From Climate Depot
UN Environment Program Press Release of new study with Yale Center for Ecosystems & Agriculture: “Rapid urbanization worldwide means every five days, the world adds buildings equivalent to the size of Paris, with the built environment sector already responsible for 37 percent of global emissions. A report published today by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Yale Center for Ecosystems + Architecture (Yale CEA), under the Global Alliance for Buildings and Construction (GlobalABC), offers solutions to decarbonize the buildings and construction sector and reduce the waste it generates.” …
“Until recently, most buildings were constructed using locally sourced earth, stone, timber, and bamboo. Yet modern materials such as concrete and steel often give only the illusion of durability, usually ending up in landfills and contributing to the growing climate crisis,” said Sheila Aggarwal-Khan, Director of UNEP’s Industry and Economy Division. “Net zero in the building and construction sector is achievable by 2050, as long as governments put in place the right policy, incentives and regulation to bring a shift the industry action,” UNEP’s Aggarwal-Khan added.
Government regulation and enforcement is also required across all phases of the building life cycle – from extraction through end-of-use – to ensure transparency in labeling, effective international building codes, and certification schemes…“The decarbonization of the buildings and construction sector is essential for the achievement of the goal of limiting global warming to 1.5°C.
Nairobi, 12 September 2023 – Rapid urbanisation worldwide means every five days, the world adds buildings equivalent to the size of Paris, with the built environment sector already responsible for 37 per cent of global emissions. A report published today by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Yale Center for Ecosystems + Architecture (Yale CEA), under the Global Alliance for Buildings and Construction (GlobalABC), offers solutions to decarbonize the buildings and construction sector and reduce the waste it generates.
The report, Building materials and the climate: Constructing a new future, offers policy makers, manufacturers, architects, developers, engineers, builders and recyclers a three-pronged solution to reduce “embodied carbon” emissions and the negative impacts on natural ecosystems from the production and deployment of building materials (e.g., cement, steel, aluminium, timber, biomass):
- Avoid waste through a circular approach: building less by repurposing existing buildings is the most valuable option, generating 50-75 per cent fewer emissions than new construction; promote construction with less materials and with materials that have a lower carbon footprint and facilitate reuse or recycle.
- Shift to ethically and sustainably sourced renewable bio-based building materials, including timber, bamboo, and biomass. The shift towards properly managed bio-based materials could lead to compounded emissions savings in many regions of up to 40 per cent in the sector by 2050. However, more policy and financial support is needed to ensure the widespread adoption of renewable bio-based building materials.
- Improve decarbonisation of conventional materials that cannot be replaced. This mainly concerns the processing of concrete, steel, and aluminium – three sectors responsible for 23 per cent of overall global emissions today – as well as glass and bricks. Priorities should be placed on electrifying production with renewable energy sources, increasing the use of reused and recycled materials, and scaling innovative technologies. Transformation of regional markets and building cultures is critical through building codes, certification, labelling, and the education of architects, engineers, and builders on circular practices.
The three-pronged Avoid-Shift-Improve solution needs to be adopted throughout the building process to ensure emissions are slashed and human health and biodiverse ecosystems are protected. The solution also requires, in its implementation, sensitivity to local cultures and climates, including the common perception of concrete and steel as modern materials of choice.
“Until recently, most buildings were constructed using locally sourced earth, stone, timber, and bamboo. Yet modern materials such as concrete and steel often give only the illusion of durability, usually ending up in landfills and contributing to the growing climate crisis,” said Sheila Aggarwal-Khan, Director of UNEP’s Industry and Economy Division.
“Net zero in the building and construction sector is achievable by 2050, as long as governments put in place the right policy, incentives and regulation to bring a shift the industry action,” she added.
To date, most climate action in the building sector has been dedicated to effectively reducing “operational carbon” emissions, which encompass heating, cooling, and lighting. Thanks to the growing worldwide decarbonisation of the electrical grid and the use renewable energies, these are set to decrease from 75 per cent to 50 per cent of the sector in coming decades.
Since buildings contain materials produced in disparate regions across the globe, reducing “embodied carbon” emissions from production and deployment of building materials requires decisionmakers to adopt a whole life-cycle approach. This involves harmonized measures across multiple sectors and at each stage of the building lifecycle – from extraction to processing, installation, use, and demolition.
Government regulation and enforcement is also required across all phases of the building life cycle – from extraction through end-of-use – to ensure transparency in labelling, effective international building codes, and certification schemes. Investments in research and development of nascent technologies, as well as training of stakeholders in the sectors, are needed, along with incentives for cooperative ownership models between producers, builders, owners, and occupants to the shift to circular economies.
“The decarbonisation of the buildings and construction sector is essential for the achievement of the goal of limiting global warming to 1.5°C. By providing cutting-edge scientific insights as well as very practical recommendations to reduce embodied carbon, the study ”Building materials and the climate: Constructing a new future” advances our joint mission to decarbonise the sector holistically and increase its resilience”, said Dr. Vera Rodenhoff, Deputy Director General for International Climate Action and International Energy Transition of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action (BMWK), which together with the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) has funded the study.
Case studies from Canada, Finland, Ghana, Guatemala, India, Peru, and Senegal, demonstrate how decarbonisation takes places using “Avoid-Shift-Improve” strategies: developed economies can devote resources to renovating existing ageing buildings, while emerging ones can leapfrog carbon-intensive building methods to alternative low-carbon building materials.
Cities worldwide can drive the implementation of decarbonisation. Many are already integrating vegetated surfaces, including green roofs, façades, and indoor wall assemblies to reduce urban carbon emissions and cool off buildings, increase urban biodiversity and more.
NOTE TO EDITORS
About the UN Environment Programme (UNEP)
UNEP is the leading global voice on the environment. It provides leadership and encourages partnership in caring for the environment by inspiring, informing and enabling nations and peoples to improve their quality of life without compromising that of future generations.
About the Global Alliance for Buildings and Construction (GlobalABC)
Founded at COP21, hosted by UNEP and with 289 members, including 40 countries, the GlobalABC is the leading global platform for all buildings stakeholders committed to a common vision: A zero-emission, efficient and resilient buildings and construction sector.
About Yale Center for Ecosystems + Architecture (Yale CEA)
Yale CEA unites researchers and practitioners across multiple fields, synthesising innovations in science, art and humanities towards ecosystems that prioritise the requirements of living organisms and ecologies. Our mission is to transform the DNA of the Built Environment, which is currently the sector responsible for the largest real-time climate change impacts and the consumption/production of toxic, non-renewable resources.
For more information, please contact:
News and Media Unit, UN Environment Programme
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Key excerpts:
UN Environment Program Press Release of new study with Yale Center for Ecosystems & Agriculture: “Rapid urbanization worldwide means every five days, the world adds buildings equivalent to the size of Paris, with the built environment sector already responsible for 37 percent of global emissions. A report published today by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Yale Center for Ecosystems + Architecture (Yale CEA), under the Global Alliance for Buildings and Construction (GlobalABC), offers solutions to decarbonize the buildings and construction sector and reduce the waste it generates.” …
UN plan promises massive emission cuts in the construction sector – the most polluting and toughest to decarbonize…building materials (e.g., cement, steel, aluminum, timber, biomass)…materials that have a lower carbon footprint…[to] promote construction with less materials and with materials that have a lower carbon footprint and facilitate reuse or recycle.
Shift to ethically and sustainably sourced renewable bio-based building materials, including timber, bamboo, and biomass…Priorities should be placed on electrifying production with renewable energy sources, increasing the use of reused and recycled materials, and scaling innovative technologies.
“Until recently, most buildings were constructed using locally sourced earth, stone, timber, and bamboo. Yet modern materials such as concrete and steel often give only the illusion of durability, usually ending up in landfills and contributing to the growing climate crisis,” said Sheila Aggarwal-Khan, Director of UNEP’s Industry and Economy Division. “Net zero in the building and construction sector is achievable by 2050, as long as governments put in place the right policy, incentives and regulation to bring a shift the industry action,” UNEP’s Aggarwal-Khan added.
Government regulation and enforcement is also required across all phases of the building life cycle – from extraction through end-of-use – to ensure transparency in labeling, effective international building codes, and certification schemes…“The decarbonization of the buildings and construction sector is essential for the achievement of the goal of limiting global warming to 1.5°C.
A glimpse of such a future.
https://youtu.be/uq7noaMwLfg
Bamboo houses in Florida.
Guess they want to boost the “Climate Change” related death toll numbers.
The present ones aren’t scary enough.
They want to boost the rat, cockroach, and termite numbers, also. Climate change isn’t scary or efficient enough. We need plague.
I would agree proposal from the grand Poohbahs at the UN, but with one caveat.
You first.
When they are willing to live in timber and stone homes of the size they propose, use the public transport they support, and stay in their 15 minute community and refrain from the use of fossil fuels, then I will give their proposals due consideration.
Until then, I will pay as much heed to them as I would a preacher demanding abstinence and monogamy from us while he has a harem of concubines.
And what are they going use to bind their stone houses together?
Rapid urbanization worldwide means every five days, the world adds buildings equivalent to the size of Paris
They simply made that number up. And it’s not very impressive. The area of Paris is .oooo7% of the earth’s land surface. The buildings added are not in one spot so it would be difficult to see this growth even from sophisticated orbital equipment. Well, maybe a Chinese weather balloon could pick it up.
A simple first step towards these ‘stone, timber and bamboo’ objectives would be to construct all wind turbine supports from stone, timber and bamboo.
The UN can take a hike.
The UN don’t hike…
.. they take luxury limousines and private jets.
Note that not one of the little trollettes has come out in defence of this idiocy.
When we see the high and mighty leading by example the great unwashed just might be inspired to follow their example. But even the leaders of the greenies who insist we must not use resources in most cases are wearing polyester clothes (by product of Petroleum), driving an EV car and telling us how clever they are (children working in mines in africa to supply the battery manufacturers), using mobile phones. I could expand upon this but will not.
And what effect willl this have on the existing populace? And on the present infrastructure? This stampede toward utopia is on a collision course with disaster. IMHO, of course.
What else could one expect from the UN: return to a pre-industrial society, and it will save the planet, civilization and anything else worth saving. But who’s listening?
You will return to the Stone Age, and be happy.
All this on the back of an unproven hypothesis that CO2 is the driver of climate. What planet are these people on??
I have been to parties at the Kensington Roof Gardens which actually has a lot of concrete surface. But there is surely a conflict with the idea of rooftop solar.
If world population projections are correct, then housing demand might decline by 2050.
Other factors matter, like increasing square feet per person and shrinking household size – but a little old house in the suburbs should eventually regain feasibility for someone who can tear down flowery wallpaper.