The climate crisis demands…decarbonizing everything everywhere

Climate Imperative

It is almost impossible to fully comprehend how deeply embedded fossil fuels and petroleum-based materials are in current practices of industry, agriculture, transportation, and buildings. Curtailing climate change requires the elimination of greenhouse gas emissions (“decarbonizing”) every aspect of how buildings are designed, constructed, occupied, renewed, and re-purposed. These actions must be implemented worldwide.

Most of today’s accepted principles and practices aimed at curtailing climate change and producing a sustainable and resilient future are in fact glass-half-full ideas, burdened with modern-era bias. For decades, reducing operational emissions has been prioritized without regard to the enormous quantities of embodied emissions produced by construction. Both must be accounted for equally.

Avoiding emissions by optimizing the benefit of existing resources is the only reliable and rapid path to zero emissions – especially resources as durable and resource-intensive as buildings. The care, reuse, and adaptation of existing buildings and communities must be made the first priority of climate action policies and programs.