Industry produces net zero standard

The net zero building standard pilot was released on Tuesday and may become the methodology industry will practice. This would provide some standardisation to the current proliferation of net zero definitions. The standard is a deep technical manual on how to evidence your building achieves net zero, helping to narrow its definition. The standard can be found https://www.nzcbuildings.co.uk/ and has been developed with many contributors across industry.

Below are 5 high level points that will get you up to speed:

1. It covers operational and embodied carbon emissions but is not mandatory, yet.
2. It introduces a new term called net zero aligned buildings. The alignment is to the entire building stock and the changes required to meet national energy and carbon budgets.
3. It sets specific target that need to be achieved or improved upon for completed or operational buildings across many sectors;
4. It centralises a lot of information on terminology, standards, and methodologies on assessing the carbon impact of developing and operating buildings;
5. The standard is expected to expand over time, to include limits on items such as embodied carbon.