With an aim to help understand the measurement of energy efficiency for buildings from a whole-life carbon viewpoint, the BCO has published the Whole-Life Carbon Footprint Measurement And Office report to prepare for tighter environmental legislation on office design.
Under the pressure of new legislation shifting the balance from operational emission management to embodied emission management, the report emphasized the consideration of embodied carbon for helping reduce the overall carbon footprint of existing and new office buildings. The Member States will be required by the European Directive CEN TC 3502 on legislation that ensure new buildings are designed according to the whole-life approach. In addition, the Energy Performance Certificates (EPCs) are expected to be applied on all private buildings above a certain size for reinforce carbon reduction commitment.
From this report, it was indicated that the air-conditioned offices locating out of the town have the highest carbon footprint than other office types, mainly due to their in-use emissions. Moreover, the commercial and other non-domestic buildings account for one-fifth of the operational carbon emissions in the UK, and their proportions becomes higher once the embodied carbon emissions are taken into account as well.
(Published in Specification Magazine, April 2012)
