Climate resilience and the importance of Embodied and operational Carbon

Evidence based strategies such as for retrofitting existing buildings and achieving extremely low energy demand has been demonstrated throughout Ireland and the UK over the last 10-15 years. Fabric first has proven itself to be the most resilient approach, supported by renewables. Energy generated by renewables to offset poor fabric performance is no longer acceptable. An assessment of the embodied carbon and operational carbon can offer a far more rapid an circular approach to achieving carbon reduction and energy resilience in Ireland. With the EU announcing that Cork is to become one of EU's first climate neutral cities by 2030 it is critical that it focuses on embodied carbon and operational carbon during this transition. Embodied carbon accounts for up to 50% of the whole life cycle carbon of a typical building project. The offsetting of renewables to achieve NZEB in retrofit has been brought into question this week in the Oireachtas. It is of some concern that the emphasis on achieving climate neutrality is heavily focused on renewables in the Development Plan with no emphasis on the importance of assessing embodied carbon, particularly where the re-use of existing stock can be of benefit in this regard.