Fresh thinking will cut carbon

Mar 27 2008 By The Journal

WE have had two years’ experience of designing and constructing to the 2006 Part L building regulations, the intent of which is to reduce the carbon dioxide emission of naturally ventilated buildings by 23% and air conditioned buildings by 28%.

The design team can, in most instances, achieve these reductions and more, without the use of on-site renewable energy technologies, by using high efficiency construction materials and plant, improved construction techniques and computer modelling to enable rapid comparison of alternative designs during the initial stages of a project.

The Department of Communities and Local Government has begun a review of the current Part L building regulations, with revised regulations expected to be in force from April 2010.

It is widely expected that the 2010 regulations will aim to reduce buildings’ carbon dioxide emissions by a further 20% to 25%, resulting in buildings with 50% of the emissions of buildings constructed to the pre-2006 building regulations. This will inevitably present further challenges to the industry; however we are confident it will be achievable, as some of our current projects are already demonstrating.

The Chancellor announced in the Budget that all new offices, shops and other commercial buildings are expected to be zero carbon by 2019. In addition, by 2018, public buildings – including schools and hospitals – are expected to be carbon neutral.

The Government intends to set up a task force to see how this can be achieved. While the target is zero carbon, it is widely acknowledged that this will not be without challenges and it is noteworthy that Mr Darling used the word “expected”.

While it is possible technically to achieve zero carbon commercial buildings, there are undoubtedly severe cost penalties in doing so. Even anticipating a price reduction in renewable energy technologies as their use becomes mainstream, the cost of building zero carbon buildings will still exceed currently allowable building forms because of the duplication of energy sources and their space needs. With the advent of biofuel electricity generation and heating systems, it is possible to have a zero carbon building now, but we need guidance on the true “greenness” of biofuels as there are a confusing number and type of products available.

The well-publicised palm oil biofuel debate revealed that rainforest is being felled to make way for palm oil production – this cannot be truly sustainable.

Narec (New and Renewable Energy Centre) at Blyth in Northumberland, in conjunction with Newcastle University and One NorthEast, is testing biofuel powered combined heat and power units which could solve both the electricity generation and heating requirements of buildings using zero carbon technologies. They are testing various biofuels and we await their findings with interest.

When designing buildings we should also take into account the predicted rise in temperatures caused by our previous emissions as well as reducing our current carbon footprint. We should be designing to mitigate the acknowledged outcome of global warming that we are already seeing happen.

David Wright is Desco director for sustainable design