Beyond Energy Efficiency

Why Embodied Carbon in Materials

Matters

Better Buildings by Design, Feb 7, 2019

IPCC report summary:

“The next few years are probably the most important in our history.”

“The report finds that limiting global warming to 1.5°C would require “rapid and far-reaching” transitions in land, energy, industry, buildings, transport, and cities. Global net human-caused emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) would need to fall by about 45 percent from 2010 levels by 2030, reaching ‘net zero’ around 2050. This means that any remaining emissions would need to be balanced by removing CO2 from the air.

“Limiting warming to 1.5ºC is possible within the laws of chemistry and physics but doing so would require unprecedented changes,” said Jim Skea, Co-Chair of IPCC Working Group III.

This is serious...

Our modeling for this

presentation looks at impacts

by 2050

Our industry is a central part of the global emissions problem...

Total 39%

Carbon isn’t an enemy... The carbon cycle is crucial to all life on earth.We’ve been adding more to the atmosphere than the available sinks can take up.We need to slow (and eventually minimize) emissions… and increase sinks.

https://www.nationalgeographic.com

We’ve done it before...

We can do it again.

Humans are innovators, and we are capable of changing behaviour and technology on a grand scale.

It’s that time again.

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Photo by Claudio Hirschberger on Unsplash

If we are to meet the 10 year deadline for halting emissions...

Hold on, let’s reframe that…

We WILL meet the 10 year deadline! To do so, we need to:

● Identify practices & products that cause emissions, and know how much. Then stop doing this.

● Identify practices & products that store carbon, and know how much. Then start doing this.

The building industry is well-positioned to make a meaningful contribution...Other sectors face serious disruption in their business model… think fossil fuels, agriculture, transportation.

We can tweak what we are already doing and do a bunch of good.

We can make some slightly larger tweaks and do a whole bunch of good.

We don’t need to stop building. We need to make carbon-storing buildings!

We have to address today’s emissions, and they are embodied emissions

Embodied carbon is the emissions that result from harvesting, transportation and manufacturing of building materials.

These emissions occur before the building begins operation…

“Time value” of carbon

Mapping a pathway to carbon-storing buildings...1. Create embodied carbon

models:a. Two buildingsb. Four assembliesc. Two levels of efficiency

2. Create energy models of all the model buildings

3. Examine combined embodied and operational emissions until 2050

https://www.architecturaldesigns.com/house-plans/80592pm https://www.newsociety.com/Books/M/Making-Better-Buildings

Multi-family residential, 8 unit10,300 square feetFour story

Single family residential2,000 square feetBungalow with full basement

Mapping a pathway to carbon-storing buildings...

The results...

84,4

00

225,

000

-10,

100

-128

,000

102,

600

241,

800

-135

,100

-11,

000

29,3

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64,3

00

7,50

0

-28,

000

35,5

00

77,7

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-31,

700

7,00

0

Multi-family, embodied CO2e emissions, kg Single-family, embodied CO2e emissions, kg

Standard practice is carbon-intensive

Lots of conventional materials are very carbon intensive

Zero carbon footprint is achievable with off-the-shelf materials

Materials exist for buildings with extensive carbon sink potential

The results, embodied CO2e kg per square meter...

What’s not showing up here?Figures are based on a “Cradle-to-Gate” analysis

● Does not include transportation to site● Does not include site energy

inputs/emissions● Does not include end-of-life impacts

These matter too, but can only be calculated according to specific location and practices. It’s up to each of us to add this piece to our calculations.

What does this mean?There was 241.1 million square meters of new residential construction (non-high-rise) in the US in 2017...

“Moderate carbon” at 133.5 kg/m2= 32.2 million tonnes of CO2e= 9 coal fired power plants*

Worst Case Scenario at 345.9 kg/m2= 83.4 million tonnes of CO2e= 23 coal fired power plants*

Best Case Scenario at -150.7 kg/m2= -36.3 million tonnes of CO2e= Removing emissions from 10 coal plants*

X*500 MW PLANT WITH 3.5 MILLION TONS OF CO2e EMISSIONS ANNUALLY

Timber (sustainably harvested)

Wood fiber board Hempcrete Cork

Rice hulls (& coconut, palm kernel, etc)

Cellulose (waste paper fiber) Waste textiles Straw

(waste ag fiber)BambooBamCore

ReWall(waste drinking

boxes)

What are these magical, carbon-storing materials?

2.16 billion tons of grain straw were grown globally in 2016. That’s enough carbon storage to offset all current transportation GHG emissions and more than replace all current insulation materials.

Come on, can we really build with straw?

Ecococon straw SIPs

Modcell straw SIPs

Endeavour straw SIPs

AgriBoard straw SIPs

Formaldehyde-free straw panelsStramit & Ekopanely

ISO-Stroh straw insulation

Looking at the whole carbon picture...

Embodied + Operational+ Time

= Overall Climate Impact

There is bad news, and there is good news...

This building can be a major contributor to climate change, or…

This building can be a major contributor to climate drawdown.

● Quantify material volumes, weights, and R-values to help with CO2e calculations● Comparable data sets are challenging to access now, but will be getting easier● Note margins of error and accuracy - look for patterns, not exact quantification!● Relating cost to carbon storage can help identify “best bang for buck”

Trillium-Lakelands

Elementary

Teachers’ Union

office building

Lindsay, Ontario

2,400 sf, $208/sq.ft

71 tons of net CO2

storage

This can be done now, affordably...

http://endeavourcentre.org/2015/05/teachers-union-office-building-slideshow/

Zero toxins - 105% net energy production on site - 90% of materials from 250 km radius - 80% less construction waste

Zero House project, 2017Clarksburg, Ontario1,100 square feet, $254/sq.ft24 tons of CO2 storageZero toxins75% net energy production on site90% of materials from 250 km radius95% less construction waste

This can be done now, affordably...

http://endeavourcentre.org/2019/01/zero-house-slide-show/

We’ve got this...

Decades ago, smart and passionate people started working on building energy efficiency. Most people thought they were nuts.

Now, those concepts are at the core of mainstream building practice and code, as programs such as Passive House take them to new levels.

That ambition and dedication provides a template for tackling the “other piece of the pie”: embodied emissions.

“In the long term, a sustainable forest management strategy aimed at maintaining or increasing forest carbon stocks, while producing an annual sustained yield of timber, fiber, or energy from the forest, will generate the largest sustained mitigation benefit.”

-IPCC report

To which we would include... a sustainable agriculture strategy that is

also aimed at increasing soil carbon stocks

Keeping an eye on the wider context ...● Regenerative forestry and agriculture - don’t shift

carbon emissions to land use change and deforestation. We must support soil building and carbon storage in the soil.

● We must support systems that support social justice and do not replicate patterns of white supremacy, racism, gender violence and other forms of human separation.

● Farm and forest products have the potential to support economically-underserved rural regions, and in turn provide affordable housing, functional farms, cooperatives, and other benefits of a working landscape.

1. Learn about low-embodied carbon and carbon storing materials and how to use them effectively and durably in buildings.

2. Use EPDs to get “good enough” data to identify patterns of material carbon emission profiles.

3. Run energy models to calculate operational carbon and analyze with embodied carbon, and develop strategies that optimize climate impact reduction.

4. Implement these methods IMMEDIATELY.

From “know why” to “know how” ...

1. Build with carbon-storing materials to turn our buildings into carbon banks.2. Work with regenerative agriculture and silviculture practices to preserve soil

carbon as we harvest plant-based low-toxicity materials.3. Invest in farm and forest products to empower economically-disenfranchised

rural communities and revitalize regional-scale manufacturing.4. Welcome climate refugees as we all will be climate refugees - and work

together to build the regenerative tomorrow.5. Work for social equity, ecological repair, and justice, in all you do.

Act courageously and boldly ...

https://newframeworks.com/

http://endeavourcentre.org/

Watch for the upcoming publication of Opportunities for Carbon Capture and Storage in

Building Materials, which will include the complete data sets used for this presentation...