Select committee: Environmental Audit Committee
Conclusion 1
First report - Building to net zero: costing carbon in construction
Published 26 May 2022
Paragraph 69
Environmental Audit Committee Sustainability of the built environment All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Conclusion (the committee's words)
There is no Government policy requiring the assessment or control of embodied carbon emissions from buildings. As a result, no progress has been made in reducing these emissions within the built environment. This inaction remains despite the built environment making up 25 per cent of the UK’s total greenhouse gas emissions and the UK’s Nationally Determined Contribution, made at COP26, committing the UK to achieve a 68% reduction in the UK’s carbon emissions by 2030. This is only eight years away. This is an extremely short time frame within which to start assessing and substantially reducing embodied carbon emissions. The first step must be a requirement to undertake whole-life carbon assessments for buildings so the industry can start measuring and then controlling for this carbon.
From: Environmental Audit Committee, First report - Building to net zero: costing carbon in construction (HC 103), paragraph 69, 26 May 2022
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 30 September 2022 (deadline 26 July 2022).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government agrees that whole-life carbon assessments are "likely to have a significant role" in decarbonising construction, but it does not commit to mandating them and says it will consult on its approach to embodied carbon in 2023.
- On a mandatory requirement, it "intends to consult in 2023" and will "consider" what levers, including building regulations, will be needed. It says it is "too soon to commit" to ratcheted carbon targets.
- It agrees a standardised calculation method is required and "will look at whether" endorsing specific standards, methodologies or tools "is appropriate".
- It declines to bring forward the Future Homes Standard to 2023, stating it "will not look to alter the timeframe" and that the 2025 timeline delivers on net zero commitments while ensuring homes are delivered in sufficient numbers.
- On public procurement, it says the Procurement Bill would not be an appropriate place for net zero policy priorities, and that there are "no plans to collect and publish" data on whole-life carbon assessments under the Construction Playbook.