Green Innovation and Transition Management
The changing built environment
The built environment is where we live, work and play, and affects how we do these things. The design and function of buildings in terms of support and impact on people has always been an important part of the built environment. However, until recently not much thought has been given to the impact this has on the wider environment. As society is becoming more aware of environmental issues, sustainability in all aspects of life is rising on the agenda.
Societies and governments are now asking for fundamentally different sustainable built environments which will require the construction and property sectors to radically change. This is certainly the case in the UK, where currently our buildings significantly impact the environment throughout their life. In response to this immense environmental burden, there is a growing raft of legislation, regulation and user demand requiring that buildings and settlements become far more environmentally sustainable.
The importance of this is recognised by the UK Government: the Climate Change Act 2008 has placed a target of reducing carbon emissions by 26% by 2020 (compared to a 1990 baseline) and by a minimum of 80% by 2050. There are many different ways of working towards achieving this, but due to the impact that our built environment has on carbon emissions (our buildings are responsible for 45% of total carbon emissions) looking at how to reduce emissions through the life of buildings is a high priority. All new homes will need to be zero-carbon by 2016, public sector buildings by 2018 and private buildings by 2019.
The requirements placed on built environment do not just include buildings; they involve communities and environments. The scale, complexity and urgency of the sustainability challenges we face require radical complex changes in the regulation, design, delivery and operation of buildings and infrastructure to make a significant contribution to the transition to a low carbon economy.
Transition
The process of transition to more sustainable built environments brings about many questions, and integrated research has a big role to play in developing appropriate solutions.
Energy companies are investing in renewable energy generation and exploring new ways to optimise the interplay between supply and demand through smart grid infrastructure, which is a form of electricity network using digital technology. New tools are being developed to assist designers, clients and users in determining the environmental performance of buildings and settlements. Construction and property companies and global supply chains are developing digitally-enabled service delivery capabilities to produce sustainable buildings, as well as embedding sustainability in their own businesses through corporate social responsibility. Finally, users are being asked to play a part in adopting sustainable technologies and practices which reduce energy consumption.
Technology shapes behaviour, but behaviour also shapes technology. Individuals and organisations are not guaranteed to always make changes by choice, and any policy to encourage change needs to be appropriate. Economic considerations play an important role in the transition to more sustainable built environments. Who will pay for new incentives and changes? With major purchasing decisions, such as buying a house value for money and location are seen as more important than sustainability by the vast majority of the population. The transition to a sustainable built environment will therefore require a redesign of current business models and value propositions. Capital cost and value models which work through the life of buildings will need to be considered, and how these actually work in real world situations.
What is clear from all of this is that no one part of society or single activity can bring about the required transition to sustainable built environments. There needs to be a co-ordinated transition management approach which galvanises these multiple strands of activity into an integrated whole. The unanswered question is whether or not we have the knowledge capital, technologies, systems, processes and skills to make it happen? This challenge has been distilled into stark terms for the construction industry, for instance, by the UK government’s Low Carbon Construction Innovation and Growth Team, by its simple question: ‘is the construction industry fit for purpose for the transition to a low carbon economy?’ There is a compelling need for a multi-disciplinary research agenda to ensure the answer to this question is a credible, enduring ‘yes.’
Multi-disciplinary, multi-actor, multi-level, multi-phase problems require multi-disciplinary, multi-actor, multi-level, multi-phase solutions. There is a need to integrate economists, planners, technologists, sociologists, psychologists and meteorologists. At Reading, in collaboration with national and international academic and industry partners, we are making strong contributions to this. We are drawing upon and integrating research from across the physical and social sciences’ spectrum to develop the construction and property industry capacity to deliver high value, sustainable built environments.