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  • What is civil
    engineering?

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The Carbon Project

Towards Net Zero for Infrastructure

Our mission

Our mission is to harness the capability and capacity of the global civil engineering community to:

Bring about a transformation in our and our client’s business models through provision of robust thought leadership, nurturing collaboration and building knowledge and skills

Make carbon accountancy business as usual for all operating in the infrastructure space

Provide the evidence base for decision makers to legislate for a net zero infrastructure system

  • Measuring, monitoring and reporting

    Net Zero Target

    The UK government has legislated to cut greenhouse gas emissions to net-zero by 2050. This target meets the UK’s obligations under the Paris Agreement and responds to the urgent need for action highlighted by the IPCC in its report on 1.5°C of global warming.

    But ending the UK’s contribution to climate change under the net-zero target requires urgent ambitious action across all sectors of the UK’s economy – none more so for than for the UK’s infrastructure systems.

    Committee on Climate Change
  • Capacity, Capability and Education

    The Role of ICE

    Following the release of the ICE’s State of the Nation report, The Carbon Project: Towards Net Zero Infrastructure has begun to turn recommendations into reality as it aims to harness the capability and capacity of the global civil engineering community.

    This next phase is a programme of activity that delivers tangible outputs for our members to implement and use so that they can start making a change within their practice and help deliver net zero carbon emissions.

    State of the Nation 2020
  • Systems approach

    The Global Picture

    The Paris Agreement, adopted in 2015, aims to strengthen the global response to the threat of climate change by keeping a global temperature rise below 2 degrees.

    Alongside this, the UN sustainable development goal 13 is focuses on Climate Action. Target 13.3 is particularly relevant to the Carbon Project: “Improve education, awareness-raising and human and institutional capacity on climate change mitigation …”

    This program of work will therefore run alongside our other programs of activity focused on the SDGs like the Sustainability Route Map and our work with the World Federation of Engineering Organisations.

    Sustainability Route Map

Our work

With a focus on delivering a programme of outputs leading up to COP26, The Carbon Project is an industry-wide response, bringing together leaders and experts from across the supply chain to tackle some of the challenges that are slowing progress towards net zero.

It represents the start of a long-term programme of collaborative work, which will seek to share knowledge and best practice on delivering low-carbon solutions across the industry.

The work will be driven by a steering group of industry leaders, chaired by ICE President elect, Rachel Skinner and focuses on three workstreams where ICE can make an immediate impact and provide focus for our activities before, during and after COP26.

Measuring, Sharing and Benchmarking of Carbon Impacts

Chair: Kat Ibbotson - Programme carbon and cost manager – Environment Agency

The net-zero challenge, in all its scale and complexity, requires a cross-industry response with collaboration at its heart. An open approach to carbon reporting will hasten industry transformation and bolster collaborative efforts. The whole value chain – including asset owner/managers, designers, constructors and product/material suppliers – should be able to contribute to and benefit from these developments.

Consideration of carbon impacts covering capital, operational and user GHG emissions will allow management of carbon within both the control and influence of infrastructure. Taking a whole-life approach will maximise opportunities for joint carbon and cost reductions. The scope of capital carbon impact considerations will need to include materials, products, design solutions and construction techniques.

Measuring and monitoring is important because if we do not monitor and measure, we will not know if our interventions are delivering the desired change, or if we are focusing our intervention effort in the most important, impactful areas. Consideration of carbon impacts - and understanding these impacts within the context of the Paris Agreement - will allow the value chain to better understand the impact and value of the project. This can have a motivational effect and link in with a broader appraisal of project outcomes, for example based on the UN SDGs.

Sharing is important because it helps engagement and enables benchmarking. Benchmarking and having sound data in the public domain changes attitudes and priorities.

Capability Building in Low Carbon Design and Delivery

Chair: Steve Denton - Executive Director & Head of Civil, Bridge and Ground Engineering at WSP

Making progress on net-zero carbon design and delivery against the demands of clients, society and pressures on costs requires new skills, refreshed knowledge and professional support, especially when it comes to new regulations, challenging design standards and codes, specification of zero carbon solutions and designing for automated delivery.

Identifying Systems-Level Reduction in In-Use Carbon

Chair: Tim Chapman – Director - Arup

Infrastructure is heavily networked and interconnected, composed of ‘systems within systems.’ Reducing the greenhouse gas emissions associated with its use therefore requires a strategic approach. As the majority of the assets that will be in use by 2050 have already been built, we will have to make the assets we have already work more efficiently, to help achieve the net zero target.

The current COVID-19 pandemic is an opportunity to ask searching questions of what society truly wants from its infrastructure systems, and whether long term demand will continue to increase unchecked.

We currently have xx resources in net zero

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All resources ():

  • Rebuilding roads might create more CO2 than you think.
    • Blog post
    • 15 April 2021

    How roadbuilding projects create CO2 emissions and what can be done to reduce them?

    The second Road Investment Strategy has been challenged over its compatibility with reaching net zero. In this blog, we review the options for reducing carbon emissions linked to road infrastructure.

    Spillweirs Large and Small: Designing for Reservoir Floods, Belfast
  • Post Covid - The new world webinar
    • Recorded Lecture
    • 14 April, 2021

    Post Covid - The new world: How the pandemic has affected behaviour, webinar

    An exploration into how the Covid pandemic has influenced human behaviour and how this can be used as a positive change in society.

    Spillweirs Large and Small: Designing for Reservoir Floods, Belfast
  • Ground anchors
    • Recorded Lecture
    • 13 April, 2021

    Yorkshire Geotechnical Group - April evening talk, online

    Yorkshire Geotechnical Group– April 2021 evening talk

    Spillweirs Large and Small: Designing for Reservoir Floods, Belfast

Keep up-to-date with developments

    • News
    • 28 May 2020

    ICE Learning hub update - Systems Thinking

    • News
    • 12 May 2020

    ICE Learning Hub update - Sustainable cities

    • News
    • 03 March 2020

    ICE library recommendations on sustainability

  • What do we need to do to manage water sustainably?
    • News
    • 28 January 2020

    ICE entries for Chris Binnie Award open

    We want your contributions to the ICE award
View ICE news

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