DG GROW holds High Level Construction Forum meeting on whole life cycle emissions
On Monday, 23 May, the European Commission’s DG GROW held a dedicated session on “Addressing whole life cycle GHG emissions in construction” as part of its High Level Construction Forum, with the objective to hear about latest developments in EU and national legislation, to discuss what further action needs to be taken at both levels and to prepare a decarbonisation roadmap by the end of 2023.
Philippe Moseley, Policy Officer at DG GROW, reminded the participants that the development of policies on whole life cycle emissions began with the Level(s) framework, which was then followed by the “Renovation Wave” strategy in 2020. The approach is also part of the Commission’s proposal for a revised Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD), the European Bauhaus initiative and the Built4Beople Partnership. In addition, it is being considered under the EU Taxonomy.
Audrey Nugent, World Green Building Council, presented the organisation’s vision of a totally decarbonised, circular, resilient and well-designed built environment that facilitates a high quality of life and pointed to the update of the Waste Framework Directive, which might also introduce new circularity requirements. She also underlined the most important challenges: a lack of existing data across Europe on whole life-cycle emissions that impedes action and the setting of targets, siloed government thinking and a lack of a fundamental understanding of the approach among government officials.
Serena Pontoglio, team leader at DG ENER, presented the key reasons for reopening the EPBD and the Commission proposal’s key elements, namely, first steps foreseen in the draft Directive towards addressing the whole life cycle of a building, e.g., via a proposed mandatory calculation of the life-cycle Global Warming Potential (GWP) of new buildings as of 2030 and new large buildings as of 2027.
Participants from the industry stressed that companies and SMEs need simple and accessible tools to perform life-cycle assessments. Standard tools and standard methodologies are also key for making the whole life-cycle approach a reality.
The discussions will contribute to define an environmental transition pathway for construction to be published by the Commission after the summer break.