Overview
In 2016, the Embodied Carbon Network was convened by the Carbon Leadership Forum in order to provide a mechanism for individuals to connect and promote awareness of embodied carbon in the built environment. The Network comprises several subject-specific taskforces, which are open to all interested individuals committed to engaging with others working toward similar goals.
Mission and Goals
We recognize that the built environment needs to phase out carbon emissions by the year 2050. We are committed to designing embodied and operational carbon out of our new and renovated buildings to achieve a carbon-neutral built environment by 2050. The network will work toward this vision through our core goals:
- Foster ongoing communication between individuals focused on embodied carbon reduction
- Drive alignment between similar research and work efforts
- Facilitate resource sharing and collaboration
- Support increased efficiency of the building sector in moving toward emissions reduction goals
Why Embodied Carbon?
What do we mean by embodied carbon? Making building materials and products cause greenhouse gas emissions. Activities such as mining, driving trucks, running factories, and combining chemicals result in emissions to the air, earth and water. Embodied carbon is the sum impact of all the greenhouse gas emissions attributed to the materials throughout their life cycle (extracting from the ground, manufacturing, construction, maintenance and end of life/disposal).
Significant progress has been made to understand how to reduce operational emissions. However, there is a gap in our knowledge and effort toward reducing embodied emissions. Recognizing that meaningful change is a collaborative effort, the Embodied Carbon Network is working to close the gap by connecting individuals working toward similar goals to accelerate embodied carbon reduction in the built environment.