Noticed this (free) Envirowise event in Loughborough on 30th Oct. Delighted to see David Hampton (Carbon Coach) is one of the speakers. I plan to attend and report back through here, and hopefully track down that elusive Construction Carbon Calculator.
For Lancashire Best Practice Club members – this is the type of event we need to host here in Lancs. I will investigate.
I am delighted that isite, fairsnape and CKE are now working together to bring news of CKE’s events and projects (focusing on the North West activities) through this blog. We also welcome Andrea Pye, CKE, as a guest blogger and contributor. Welcome to the blogosphere!
The newly created CKE page to this blog will carry more details of the events, news, and project case sudies. In addition we are working on thecreation of a similar relationship and dedicated blog space for the Women in Construction project currently under way as part of the CKE programme.
Noted on the HSE website…
This Sector Information Minute provides inspectors with background information on the issue of potential asbestos fibre release in CLASP and other ‘system’ buildings built between 1945 and 1980.
This document is published under the Freedom of Information Act.
There has been an inetresting series of articles and reports recently on technology versus hearts and minds approach to climate change, carbon management and the approach we seem to be taking to becoming green, and greening the built environment.
As mentioned here before, it was Einstein who said “we cannot solve todays problems with the same patterns of thought that created them in the past” and that we need to rethink. Technology and its use has contributed to the environmental problems of today, can we now rely on technology to take us out of it? There is a very strong case for more focus on hearts, minds and spirit, or what is becoming known as the eco-mind.
Mark Lynas (whose book High Tide should be on every shelf) writes in a recent Guardian article Can shopping change the planet?
Some in the business community argue that the whole green consumerism thing is just a passing fad, a sort of climatic version of the dotcom bubble. … According to Phil Downing, head of environmental research at Ipsos Mori, the majority of the population are “fairweather environmentalists” who remain very reluctant to take lifestyle change seriously.
George Monbiot on his blog writes
“Green consumerism is becoming a pox on the planet”, Green consumerism will not save the biosphere … drowning in eco-junk … heading for eco-cide
Are we seeing the same green commercialism, or greenwash in our built environment sector. Increasingly every product and organisation is keen to inform of green credentials.
Most material suppliers carry their Environmental Commitment on their web sites – prominently – which usually has the aim of reducing pollution or carbon emissions (eg Travis Perkins) yet how serious can they be in attempting to save carbon when these companies still sell patio heaters ? (Just one patio heater will negate the climate value of half a dozen micro wind turbines)
There is a growing need and call to verify green, carbon and environmental claims.
We seem to be heading down a technological solution route, coupled with carbon off-setting, and yet, seeing carbon emissions continue to increase.
Interviewed in the current issue of the informative Plenty journal, Function Over Form. Travis Price, a seasoned architect, architectural and environmental pioneer, takes aim at the green building movement he’s been part of for over thirty years, arguing that it’s veered off course: more technical than spiritual; more about regulation than nature. The answer, he says, is to move away from a mandated “checklist” approach and toward an inherently eco-minded design aesthetic. (take a look at the Travis Price website)
Price uses expressions like building in the spirit of place, the context of the earth, a lexicon we dont hear too much in built environment … and yet may be just the rethinking we need.
And, last week we had the Arup report for the Academy of Sustainable Communities, Mind the Gap which assessed the gaps in the supply and demand of skills required to deliver the sustainable communities programme. These are a combination of technical skills, linked to regeneration and the built environment, and generic skills, linked to, for example, finance and project management, leadership and communication and in summary
The key finding is that England faces a significant shortage of qualified professionals with the necessary skills to deliver sustainable communities between now and 2012…. A national drive to address labour shortages and skills gaps is needed .. and … Organisational culture must evolve.
Are we, in the built environment, stuck in an accommodationist view – ie we can accommodate climate and ecological change, by embracing a fair weather environmental approach, by using technology and through a little legislation – but crucially without changing lifestyles, or as the Arup report suggests educational and training issues.
A dangerous view and route to take:
The effects of climate change will be felt sooner than scientists realised and the world must learn to live with the effects, experts said yesterday. Martin Parry, a climate scientist with the Met Office, said destructive changes in temperature, rainfall and agriculture were now forecast to occur several decades earlier than thought.
A reminder that the Lancashire Best Practice Club demonstration project event is scheduled for this Thursday – details on the events page.
There is one change to the published programme in that Phil Wright, Managing Director, will be speaking on behalf of Birse Coastal in lieu of Andrew Mason.
It has long been recognised within the blogosphere at least that the biggest contribution the built environment can make to national and global carbon reductions is through existing building stock, not only through the drive for zero carbon homes by 2016 for example.
And in case we need reminding why existing buildings are key, Cyril Sweett estimate that by 2050, 60% of UK buildings will still predate 2006 Building Regs, with corresponding high fuel consumption and carbon emissions. Barring a massive technological improvement in electricity generation at source, our only option is to address existing stock. (Elemental)
Today is the start of the CIBSE 100 days of carbon clean up.
It is good to see programmes like this that address the existing building stock. Signing up to this programme will give you the guidance and tools to reduce energy and carbons within your buildings, including TM22 – the CIBSE guide to measuring carbon savings. For example are you aware of the following carbon emission factors?
Bit of a difference there between electricity and biomass!
Check out the CIBSE programme and make a saving and contribution today.
Making refurbishment a green opportunity
In addition CIBSE are hosting the Great Refurbishment Event
or refurbishment of commercial buildings both on client or consultancy side, then the Great Refurbishment Event held at The Royal Society, London on the 24 October 2007 is a must attend event for you. Experts throughout the building services world will share with you their strategies and techniques to take you from the planning stage through to integrating your refurbishment into improving your energy performance.
A recent Guardian article revealed a survey showing that
Some 55% of survey respondents had either never heard of carbon offsetting, or had heard the name but didn’t know anything about it. When asked which term best described carbon offsetting, 66% were unable to give an accurate definition.
One in five said it was “the release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere” while 19% selected “a chemical process which neutralises carbon dioxide gas before it is released into the atmosphere”. Some 2% of respondents thought carbon offsetting was a “new technique that eases trapped wind caused by carbonated/fizzy drinks”.
it may be good news though that:
Only 1% of Britons told researchers they had ever paid into a carbon offsetting programme.
With more and more use of carbon off putting schemes being used in the built environment to archive zero carbon status, one wonders what the level of understanding really is. (Maybe a survey in Building, Phil)
This seems to be the buzz at the moment in web news and blogs.
CIRIA have just published their guide Building Greener:
Green roofs and walls are widely used in many countries to provide a range of benefits for the built environment. Numerous studies have been carried out to monitor and assess the effectiveness of green roofs and green walls in the areas of biodiversity, stormwater management and climate change mitigation and adaptation.
Meanwhile HOK Green BIM have posted a directory of Green Roofs, including Carlisle Roofing here in the NW and the informative Green Roof Directory
Edwin Heathcote writing in the FT Weekend thinks so, with a few exceptions. On good form, Edwin sums up the current state of architecture, design and construction. For example, on PFI Schools and Hospitals:
Through its reliance on the Public Finance Initiative process to deliver the biggest programme of school and hospital building in two generations, it has effectively abdicated architecture to the builders. In PFI, economy comes first, design comes nowhere. Contractors employ architects as emasculated subcontractors. The schools and hospitals we are building now and which our grandchildren will still be paying for are a cultural disgrace. These are buildings in which we spend our formative years, our most emotional moments, from birth through childhood to death. As an ageing society we will all be spending longer in hospital yet we have no alternative to the bargain-bin architecture foisted upon us. I have seen brand new PFI schools that would be impossible to differentiate from low-security prisons: dim corridors and classrooms that would make you weep. For anyone who enjoys architecture and hopes that things will improve for the future, it is heartbreaking.
and on house building:
Finally, and most depressingly, the housebuilders of Britain continue to spew their brick sprawl, those depressing children’s archetypes, the toytown brick boxes. Where they attempt “contemporary” – usually for urban flats to be snapped up by buy-to-let investors – they employ the same disengaged modernist pastiche beloved of the commercial sector. This is modernism adapted as a lifestyle choice. Except for a few ambitious housing associations and developers who are employing bright young architects, the domestic architecture of Britain is an embarrassment.
Thanks to Mel over at Elemental for highlighting this for me. Ouch indeed !!
Fairsnape 