Forum discussion

GC question - who is doing the most to manage/reduce carbon in construction?

Hello friends in the construction group!

I am advising an owner on a huge redevelopment project and - we are of course looking at carbon/embodied carbon from a design perspective - but I remember hearing some of you talking about how you are addressing emissions during construction (including both recommendations related to specific materials and methods but also fleet management, scheduling / phasing work to minimize or streamline flow of transport to and fro site, etc) but of course now I can't remember who you were :)

Can anyone DM me if you have been doing this and share what you've been doing - OR if you have seen/read case studies about this - and especially if you work in MA, it will be good to have a chat about this particular project.

TIA,
Barbra (bb@sustainable-performance.org)

 

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Fri, 07/03/2020 - 01:31

I actually would like to see these responses if people want to skip the direct message and share with everyone. Skanska has obviously been a leader with helping to launch the EC3 tool for materials and embodied carbon. Collectively the Sustainable Construction Leaders are firming up a framework for how to measure and track construction related carbon impacts with the goal of releasing this in 2020 as a guideline for everyone in the industry. This process has been informed by some of those already doing things like tracking equipment emissions and fleet management. I think we are not as along in MA as we should be, but I’d be interested to hear from others. I know Conor at Columbia has been a relentless advocate for fleet electrification and jobsite charging, but I am not sure any of us locally have implemented solutions at scale. One thing we (Consigli) do is offer to lock in an electricity rate from an energy broker for the duration of construction and then offer to offset construction electricity by purchasing it as renewable. As long as electricity prices don’t go down it saves the owner money and you can offset construction electricity emissions. Steven Burke. LEED & WELL Faculty Sustainability Manager m: 774.462.2044 consigli.com Fro

Fri, 07/03/2020 - 02:44

Couple other quick thoughts: Because we self-perform we rent some of our equipment directly and have emissions control standards for those purchases. That is a lot easier than mandating it to subcontractors. We have also done emissions tracking for construction equipment on projects where it’s asked (shamefully not every project yet). Two that come to mind are an athletic center project in Maine, and there are emissions requirements for the Green Line Extension (GLX) project we are working on locally. The Maine project is doing both LEED and SITES, and SITES is where the emissions piece came in. The GLX project is using Envision as a guideline, but I don’t know if the emissions requirements came from Envision or Arup. LEED has the “Clean Construction” pilot credit. Between that and the SITES criteria you could probably be off to a pretty good start for equipment emissions with standard language to build off of. Steven Burke. LEED & WELL Faculty Sustainability Manager m: 774.462.2044 consigli.com From: B

Fri, 07/03/2020 - 19:31

Thanks Steven! agree - good to share the responses (I was just trying to be sensitive to inbox fatigue - but you are right!) Great - I assume the SCL's will post when the guideline is done? I had a dim memory about - possibly Webcore? (or another CA based GC) presenting about their great approach to this some years ago - but I could be mistaken. Measuring and tracking carbon is obviously a critical step - will the guide also include ideas for actions (like fleet management/phasing/LED site lighting and other wide variety of strategies and tactics?) I love your site electricity approach! Any other SCL folks have cool things you're doing???

Tue, 07/07/2020 - 12:59

We (Columbia) are working with SCL and I'm optimistic about the outcomes of that group. Columbia has already implemented 100% LED jobsite lighting requirement and, as Steven mentioned, Columbia provides all employees (office and field) access to FREE electric car charging. I strongly believe that free EV charging by employers is an important and necessary step in decarbonizing the economy, especially since the primary use of vehicles is for commuting to work and its also the leading GHG emitter. (note: not free parking, but free charging if parking is available)

Wed, 07/08/2020 - 06:05

Hi Barbra, I help manage Turner's 2030 goal, which is to reduce our jobsite carbon emissions and water consumption by 50% by the year 2030. My role is almost entirely focused on measuring and reducing job site emissions within the project fence. We have been measuring baseline consumption values and making reductions for a few years now. I am happy to speak to you if you'd like to discuss further. Best, Emi LaFountain klafountain@tcco.com

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