Building Carbon Emissions

This article looks at the term building carbon emissions, the progression from the phrase 'embodied energy'.

Embodied Energy

The total amount of energy used in the whole life cycle of a process of product. From extraction of raw materials, material processing, product manufacture, waste, packaging, transportation, installation, use, performance, durability, maintenance, reuse and disposal. For the interior design/architecture world, this means each component of a building from the sub floor and joists to the soft furnishings and accessories.

Embodied energy is a phrase that is quite well understood in the building trade. To look at this on a deeper level, the phrase ‘Whole life carbon’ (WLc) is now being used.

Whole life carbon (WLc)

A revision of the term embodied energy, changing the focus from energy used to carbon created as not all energy has a negative effect on the environment.

There are currently a few different methodologies for WLc which centre around 5 main parts, I have summarised these below.

Whole life carbon output for buildings

Management / Project Management carbon (PMc)

The amount of carbon created for everything that happens off site from project concept to completion. This includes travel, administration, all personnel involved in the project: designers, architects, project managers, sales, contractors, suppliers and the client.

Embodied carbon (Ec)

The amount of carbon within the materials and the constructions of the building - product sourcing, extraction, refining, processing, manufacture and transportation.

Construction carbon (Cc)

The amount of carbon created through the building process – site development, construction, installation, site equipment, site labour, material delivery, energy used on site.

Operating / Running / In-use-carbon (Rc)

The amount of carbon created by the building over the complete lifespan looking at each material and product - cleaning, repairs, renovation, refurbishment, redecoration, maintenance.

Deconstruction carbon (Dc)

The amount of carbon created at the end of the building lifespan looking at removing each material and product. This could be demolition, disposal and preparation of the land for the next construction OR deconstruction and dismantling for salvage, recycling, reuse and reclaim

Building Carbon Emissions - The future

As you can see it is not as simple as embodied energy any more – all of these aspects combined create the level of WLc. The eco architects and interior designers must now evaluate each of these elements from information provided by manufacturers and studies of lifecycle analysis. Standards have not been set in place for evaluating carbon, however they are in development by the British Standards Institution – PAS2050.

It is claimed that within the UK buildings use up to 4 times more energy over the complete lifespan than was used to construct the building itself. With this breakdown of embodied energy, this helps determine areas that can be revisited to reduce carbon emissions. Great progress.