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We envision that there is likely to be about a ten-year window of opportunity here, and the industry needs to make a start.

Ultimately, this creates far fewer opportunities for snags and delays.. Reducing risk in construction and attracting investors.Changing the risk profile of construction should unlock investment into the industry.

As things stand, we know from talking to funders that construction is seen as the riskiest investment option by far.Conversely, we know there’s a great deal of interest in financing clean technology, so there’s a lot of money going into an associated industry.Construction Platform design offers a huge opportunity, because if we could demonstrate a consistent ability to deliver things to price and budget, investors would view construction differently.

As a result, this could see investors flooding towards construction, as they would get a healthy return on their investment.There’s also the potential for the creation of a virtuous circle, whereby investment boosts spending on construction, which creates jobs and skills.

This would have a bigger, beneficial impact on society.. An increase in investment should also free up more money for research and development.

Construction has famously low investment in R&D, which increases the risk profile.In this context, bodies such as the London Energy Transformation Initiative (LETI), RIBA, GLA and UKGBC, have developed guidance documents on embodied carbon, which include specific targets and roadmaps to achieving net zero carbon prior to 2050.. Based on LETI Climate Emergency Design Guide, a typical medium size residential building embodied carbon, would be 33% of the total carbon, whilst the operational carbon would be around 67%.

However, for an ultra-low energy building, like Passivhaus, the breakdown would be 77% embodied and 23% operational and this balance is likely to become more enhanced with the decarbonisation of the grid.This means that embodied carbon is becoming a more important focus for the sustainable design of buildings..

Typical operational and embodied carbon breakdown for medium scale residential for a standard building (left) and for an ultra-low energy building.Passivhaus standard has always been focused on operational energy, and it is only in recent years that the focus has grown to both operational carbon emissions and the embodied carbon within the building..