“We must act urgently and collaboratively to transform the built environment from a leading driver of climate change to a significant and profitable solution.”

Such strong words of industry agreement are good news to , architect, engineer and 91探花 associate professor of architecture. Simonen leads a UW-hosted research group called the that brings together academics and building industry professionals to study carbon emissions across a building’s life cycle, or entire period of use, and to focus on reducing the amount of “embodied” carbon in building materials.

The statement comes from a that was shared and signed at an event called , linked with the three-day in September in San Francisco.

“Together, we can help draw down excess atmospheric carbon,” reads this Carbon Smart Building Declaration, “and create a built environment that supports a healthy, equitable, and sustainable human community.”

Carbon emissions from the built environment account for more than 40 percent of greenhouse gases worldwide, and must be dramatically reduced to combat the effects of climate change. Simonen says that construction of a single “low embodied carbon” office building could save 30 million kilograms, or 33,000 tons, in carbon emissions, Simonen says 鈥� “the emissions equivalent of avoiding driving a car around the Earth 3,000 times.鈥�

Exciting, too, Simonen said, is a new, open-source tool to track the carbon emissions of raw building materials called the , or EC3 for short. The tool, developed by the Carbon Leadership Forum in collaboration with and , can help construction professionals better report and reduce embodied carbon. No less an ally than Microsoft that it will pilot the calculator as the corporation remodels its campus. Funding for this has been provided by the Charles Pankow Foundation, the MKA Foundation and other building industry supporters such as carpet manufacturer Interface and the American Institute of Steel Construction.

The Carbon Leadership Forum is now an affiliate of , a new institute at the 91探花seeking to connect academics with people working on these environmental challenges and translate science into practical solutions.

Simonen said she was encouraged by a standing-room-only audience for Carbon Smart Building Day, the new calculator tool and the fact that so many have signed the Carbon Smart Building Declaration.

“What this means,” she said, “is we are approaching global consensus on the challenge ahead and exciting momentum on where to act to increase impact.”

Simonen added that the Carbon Leadership Forum continues to work with industry and NGO partners to build awareness of embodied carbon in construction. Another ongoing initiative, she said, is the , a platform for engagement and information to help achieve the aim of a carbon-neutral built environment by the year 2050.

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For more information, contact Simonen at 206-685-7282 or ksimonen@uw.edu.

The is a collaborative effort among academics and industry professionals based in the UW’s that studies reducing carbon emissions over a building’s entire period of use, or life cycle.

There is growing recognition in the building industry of the need to track carbon emissions across a building’s full life cycle, said , architect, structural engineer and 91探花associate professor of architecture, who leads the carbon forum. But she said industry professionals need better information and guidance on how to implement low-carbon method in practice.

The forum took a step in this direction in December by publishing the results of its . “Embodied carbon” is the name for all carbon emissions that occur when extracting, manufacturing and installing building materials. The study employs a process called 鈥� LCA for short 鈥� to measure embodied carbon emissions in buildings. Simonen wrote on the subject in 2014.

The benchmark study provides data to building industry professionals so they can include study of embodied carbon into their decision making. It includes the largest known of building-embodied carbon with information on more than 1,000 buildings. The report also provides a foundation for the next stage of the project, the development of a Life Cycle Assessment Practice Guide, due by the end of 2017.

“Manufacturing materials and constructing buildings results in significant energy use and carbon impact,” said Simonen. “This research helps us answer questions such as: Is this a high (or low) carbon building? Which material choices or building systems lead to lower carbon solutions? How significant are ‘green’ design choices?”

To place construction-related carbon emissions in real-world perspective, Simonen added: Construction alone of a single “low embodied carbon” office building could save 30 million kilograms, or 33,000 tons, in carbon emissions 鈥� “the emissions equivalent of avoiding driving a car around the Earth 3,000 times.”

This benchmarking stage follows the Carbon Leadership Forum work in 2012 to create one of the first sets of “product category rules” for reporting the environmental footprint of concrete, enabling concrete producers to more accurately report on their product’s carbon emissions. These standards have been used by the top six concrete producers in the United States to inform their selection of concrete mixes.

“In the design phase, our data enables architects and engineers to use carbon, and other environmental impacts, as a performance criteria in addition to common criteria such as cost and strength, when specifying and selecting concrete,” Simonen said.

To meet the goals of the on climate, global carbon emissions must peak by the year 2020 and fossil fuels be eliminated entirely by 2050.

The聽Embodied Carbon Benchmark Study聽is the first stage of the ongoing project called LCA for Low Carbon Construction, and was funded by the Charles Pankow Foundation, Skanska USA and the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality.

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For more information, contact Simonen at 206-685-7282 or