New London Architecture event: Towards zero-carbon London
19 Sep 2019
New London Architecture held a half day conference on 17 September entitled ‘Designing for a changing climate: towards zero-carbon London’. The conference discussed how to make London a truly sustainable, zero-carbon city, addressing sustainable materials and innovation in construction methods, lessons learned and case studies on reducing carbon emissions from the design and construction industry.
Among the nine speakers was Elaine Toogood from The Concrete Centre, who provided a round-up of everything the cement/concrete sector is doing towards delivering net zero carbon, including an overview of the progress that has been made to date. Underpinning this was the message that our sector has been measuring performance and setting targets for the last ten years, so is already very active in tackling emissions.
The importance of a circular economy approach to design was also highlighted by Elaine and was also touched on by other presenters, including Alex Lifschutz of Lifschutz Davidosn Sandiland, who used a very apt quote “A building is not something you finish, a building is something you start.” The role of thermal mass in a changing climate was another theme repeated in several of the talks.
The event was well attended with nearly 200 delegates, mostly from the design sector and included two informative panel sessions, where issues such as fire risk, life cycle analysis and regulatory needs were discussed. Overall, the concrete presentation was well received and the content appeared to surprise many in respect of the progress the sector has already made on sustainability issues.
Resources that may be of interest to those interested in the topics discussed include:
Tom De Saulles, building physicist, The Concrete Centre