Using sustainable construction to tackle climate change

Before becoming chief sustainability officer at construction company Willmott Dixon, Julia Barrett (pictured) had worked as a senior manager at Cambridgeshire CC and the Environment Agency.

For her, communication is the key to successful partnerships between construction firms and local government sectors on climate change, whether the project is a school, a leisure centre or a community health hub.

“The first thing is to start talking and get around the table and understand what success would look like for the authority and all the stakeholders involved in a particular project,” she says.

Finance is a big barrier, specifically the “siloing of capital funding versus operating funding”, which she says makes it hard for councils to accept higher upfront costs, even if they would lead to bigger long-term savings in areas such as energy.

“Too often councils are really constrained by the different funding pots and aren’t able to do that balancing off. That’s something that we aim to do, and in other sectors it’s easier.”

It is an issue Willmott Dixon “keeps flagging to government”.

When it comes to ensuring sustainable construction is affordable, she cites Willmott Dixon’s development of a “suite of standard products” in areas such as schools, homes and leisure centres.

“We want to do all the thinking and it is embedded so you get to the stage where you don’t pay a premium for it. I firmly believe that if we can build all our products to that standard then it’s not the exception, it becomes the rule. By making something the norm, you stop paying a price premium for it.”

The need for sustainable construction is an “increasing” consideration in Willmott Dixon’s work with councils. Ms Barrett says the company has been carbon neutral since 2012, and will soon launch a strategy to be “zero carbon” by 2030.

The coronavirus pandemic is having a big effect. Social distancing has “forced another level of innovation” in construction techniques – many climate positive. For example, carrying out more building work off-site increases efficiency and reduces transport miles.

But Ms Barrett says the biggest effect on the construction sector is likely to be the realisation much of the economy operated despite lockdown. “Perhaps we need to be thinking about home office space as standard,” while other changes could result from greater appetite for walking and cycling.