UK’s net zero carbon standard aims to appeal to whole sector

The Net Zero Carbon Buildings Standard initiative is bringing together the UK’s real estate and built environment industries, initially through the major professional organisations. These include the RIBA, the RICS, The Institute of Structural Engineers, CIBSE, the UK Green Buildings Council, the Better Buildings Partnership, the BRE and the Carbon Trust.

“We’ve got an incredibly wide group of people coming together, all seeking to define what a net-zero carbon asset should be,” explained David Partridge, governance board chair, Net Zero Carbon Buildings Standard.

Speaking to Real Asset Insight’s Richard Betts at the recent EPRA Sustainability Summit, he explained that the standard considers both embodied and operational carbon as applicable to new and existing buildings.

“We’re looking to come up with a standard for the entire industry to use. While it’s being created by the professions, the intention behind it is that the lenders will start demanding that loans they give to real estate conform to the standard,” said Partridge.

“We hope that the developers who are producing buildings, or the asset owners who have existing buildings or who are investing in new buildings, the big pension funds who already have huge portfolios, will also adopt this.”

The hope is that major valuation organisations, through the RICS, will also take it on board. The standard complies, for instance, with the RICS whole-life carbon standard methodology. “So, it really is an opportunity for the whole industry to come together behind one single way of measuring Net Zero.”

“So from one end of the food chain to the other, we hope the whole ecosystem will come together and use this definition for the way to move forward for real estate for the next 5-15 critical years

There is currently a proliferation of emerging standards. However, Partridge said the last thing he wanted was to come up with another set of metrics that make it even harder for asset owners, designers and developers.

“The really key thing for us is that we are working with the standards that have already been, and the methodologies that are already being, developed by the major organisations who are part of the standard.

“Rather than proliferating, what we’re actually hoping to do is to consolidate and bring together all the various different initiatives that are going on around the UK into one commonly accepted definition – it is for the industry, by the industry. That’s why it’s been really crucial that we see so many people getting involved in the delivery of it and engaging openly with the rest of the industry to find out how they would use it to make sure that it’s robust.”

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