Resource efficiency organisation WRAP (the Waste & Resources Action Programme) and the UK Green Building Council have launched a free, publicly available embodied carbon database for construction teams.
The new resource, launched in Embodied Carbon Week (7-11 April), will allow project teams to benchmark their designs to a far greater extent and to more detailed comparative data than was previously available to any single company or individual.
Users will be able to explore embodied carbon calculations for buildings at each project stage, then register calculations from their own buildings to help build a detailed comparative data set.
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WRAP and the UKGBC commissioned the project, while consultancy Arup was responsible for scoping the project, detailing the key features and designing the specification for the database.
Under project manager Andrea Charlson, Arup also coordinated data input from across the construction industry. The information that populates the database was drawn a number of supporter organisations, including Faithful+Gould, Sustain, Aecom, Sturgis Carbon Profiling, BRE, Expedition Engineering, Sainsbury’s, Marks and Spencer, Deloitte, the British Constructional Steelwork Association (BCSA), TATA Steel, the Concrete Centre, Davis Langdon and Cundall.
Gareth Brown, programme area manager at WRAP, said: “Our aim is to create an open, web-based resource for building professionals, which will have a real impact in driving down carbon emissions. The resource efficiency that the database will enable brings with it truly measurable gains to the economy as well as long term benefits to the environment.”
The project team says that database has been created in the context of the joint government and industry ambition to reduce emissions associated with the construction industry by 50% by 2025, one of the challenges laid down by the Construction 2025 industrial strategy.
Professionals from across the whole supply chain, including engineers, architects and quantity surveyors, will be able to use to benchmark building designs and as a result, identify where carbon reductions can be made.
The information in the database is presented in a clear, comprehensive and standards-compliant way to allow project teams to gain an understanding of the typical embodied carbon footprint of different building types.
While the database has initially focused on buildings, the hope is that as information is forthcoming infrastructure projects will be incorporated in the future.
Charlson said: “It’s tremendously exciting to finally see the database come to fruition. It’s going to be an invaluable resource for the whole industry and the information collated will enable us to take great strides forward in creating greater design sense around embodied carbon, and in meeting challenging carbon reduction targets.”
