Product category:
Building Energy Efficiency and Sustainability
News Release from: BRE | Subject: Green Guide to Specification
Edited by the Buildingtalk Editorial
Team on 01 August 2005
Weighting environmental impacts of
construction
BRE needs to quantify the importance of different environmental impacts for use in the current update of the Green Guide to Specification.
Is the amount of climate change produced by Europe a bigger issue than acid rain? Should we worry more about water extraction than the scarcity of fossil fuels? BRE needs to quantify the importance of different environmental impacts for use in the current update of the Green Guide to Specification, a publication used by architects, specifiers and their clients to evaluate the relative environmental impacts of different construction solutions The best performing specifications gain credits in the BREEAM and EcoHomes schemes, which more and more clients are using to measure the sustainability of their buildings
This article was originally published on Buildingtalk on 2 Oct 2003 at 8.00am (UK)
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BRE is employing a panel of experts to determine relative weightings for use in the Guide, but are also carrying out a parallel consultation that will give industry the opportunity to weight the 13 environmental impact (see notes below) categories via a web based questionnaire.
"We acknowledge that weightings is a subjective issue," says Paul Thistlethwaite from BRE Materials Team, "which we are dealing with in this way because no scientific method exists to rate the relative importance of different environmental impacts when carrying out Life Cycle Assessments of building products/materials".
Anyone with an interest in the construction industry or the environment can participate in the weightings consultation which will be conducted on-line at www.bre.co.uk/greenguide/update.
The consultation starts 15 August 2005 and will last a minimum of 3 weeks.
In addition to the review of weightings, BRE is proposing revisions to their Life Cycle Assessment Methodology and the specifications which underpin the Guide, and would welcome comments on these and any other aspect of the new Guide's development.
Details are available at www.bre.co.uk/greenguide/update.
The new version of the Green Guide will be published electronically in 2006.
This means it can be easily updated and accessed, and individual manufacturer's Environmental Profiles data can be added alongside the generic data.
A paper copy of the Green Guide will be available in early 2007.
For more information contact GreenGuide Help Desk at greenguide@bre.co.uk or call tel.
01923-664462.
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