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Elevate Constructing the Future

Carbon FootprintStudy

February 2008

Elevate Constructing the FutureCarbon Footprint StudyObjectives

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To review existing methods and tools for calculating a carbon footprint forbusiness use

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To develop a simple method for calculating the carbon footprint of a small ormicro business in the construction industry

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To provide a tool or workbook for those businesses to complete and calculatetheir carbon footprint

Scope of the study

The scope of this study is to provide a tool for individual small or micro businesses tocalculate their own carbon footprint and is not intended to calculate the carbonfootprint of a whole construction project. To do this the scope would need to besignificantly extended and the inclusion of many other factors such as raw materialselection, embodied carbon dioxide, waste disposal and the longevity of theconstruction would need to be considered. The performance of the final constructionin regards to its carbon footprint during occupation has not been included in thisstudy.

Aim of the study

The aim of the study is to provide Elevate with an overview of the carbon footprintmethodology, the calculators available and their applicability to businesses in theconstruction industry.The aim of the workbook is to provide small and micro businesses in the constructionindustry with a simple method of calculating their own carbon footprint with a view tosetting targets for reduction, reporting their performance and adopting continuousimprovement principles.

Introduction

It is widely accepted that the greenhouse gas emissions caused by human activity arehaving a negative impact on the environment and contributing to climate change.Carbon dioxide is the most important greenhouse gas arising from human activity andaccounts for nearly 80% of the UK greenhouse gas emissions. Carbon dioxide is justone of the six main greenhouse gases limited by the Kyoto protocol. The effect thateach of these greenhouse gases has on the climate varies significantly as each gas hasa different global warming potential. For simplicity of reporting, the mass of each gasemitted is commonly translated into a carbon dioxide equivalent so that the totalimpact can be summed to one figure and expressed as a carbon footprint. The totalset of greenhouse gas emissions caused directly and indirectly by an individual,organisation, event or product is called the carbon footprint.

Carbon Footprint and the Construction Industry

The UK construction industry is vast; its output is worth £100bn a year; it accountsfor 8% of GDP; and employs 2.1 million people. However, buildings are alsoresponsible for almost half of UK carbon emissions, half of water consumption, aboutone third of landfill waste and 13% of all raw materials used in the UK economy.The UK government has made a commitment to reduce carbon dioxide (CO

)emissions by at least 60% on 1990 levels by 2050 and by at least 26% by 2020.Within this, Government has already set out its policy that new homes will be zerocarbon from 2016, and an ambition that new schools, public sector non-domesticbuildings and other non-domestic buildings will be zero carbon from 2016, 2018 and2019 respectively. In support of these targets the

Code for Sustainable Homes

wasintroduced and all new homes have to have a mandatory rating. The Code measuresthe sustainability of a new home against nine categories of sustainable design, ratingthe 'whole home' as a complete package. The Code sets minimum standards forenergy and water use at each level and, within England, replaces the

EcoHomesscheme

, developed by the Building Research Establishment (BRE).To help the UK achieve these challenging commitments

The Climate Change Bill

wasintroduced into Parliament on 14 November 2007 and became law on 26th November2008. Whilst is it not completely understood what the impact on UK industry will beit is inevitable that there will be some reporting and fiscal implications that will trickledown to small and micro businesses.These are some of the external pressures on businesses to measure their carbondioxide emissions and have been briefly discussed to put this report in context of thebigger picture. From an internal perspective and in accordance with the scope of thisstudy, carbon footprint calculation is necessary for construction businesses as a simpleand complete measure of their impact on the environment and a method foridentifying ways to reduce costs.

Review of existing Carbon Footprint Calculators

Overview of calculators

Any search on the internet for carbon footprint calculators will return thousands of results. Typically the calculators available fall into one of three categories:

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Carbon Offsetting

Business

Domestic/Individual

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Environmental charity supported

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Government supported

Domestic/Individual

Business

Carbon Offsetting

For the purpose of this study it was necessary to filter out all carbon offsettingcalculators as their main purpose is to sell carbon offsets not to give an accuratecarbon footprint for performance monitoring. Their methods and conversion factors