Ed Dixon, sustainability manager at Mace, says the carbon reduction target can’t be reached until the construction industry faces some harsh truths.
January was the 50th anniversary of Sir Winston Churchill’s death, an illustrious leader who has much to teach today’s construction industry. However, did his famed “never let a good crisis go to waste” quote – which gave rise to Wostenholme’s seminal 2009 report – ring true?
Six years later, the industry is roaring away from the crash, the central London market is booming and the downturn is quickly fading to a distant memory.
But what did we learn? Did we manage to cut carbon, reduce costs and improve delivery? Did we batten down the hatches, hide ourselves away and use the time to train and to spawn innovation? With unemployment declining, 2.6% growth in the past year and a bumper start to 2015, things certainly do seem to be improving. My worry is that, without confronting the harsh realities of our current carbon quandary, we will never really work out what is required to bring about the change we so drastically need.
During the Second World War Churchill set up the Statistical Office to drip-feed news on the state of the economy into the cabinet. Knowing that his charisma and political standing would prevent his subordinates from coming forward with bad news, Churchill relied on the Statistical Office to produce reliable bad news that would help to inform decisions on the war effort.
Surely as an industry we can ask our “cabinet” (CIC, GCB) to rely on the Statistical Office (UKCG, FMB) to produce better quality bad news so we can really start to delve into the detail and uncover the issues at hand?
Seeing the wood from the trees
It seems as an industry we have a complete lack of ability to see, or tackle, the real issues affecting the environment. We focus on sustainable site cabins but the real problem is the enormous volumes of embodied carbon from logistics. We use low-flow hoses for cleaning vehicles when the real issue is the huge volume of water used to commission a building. We concern ourselves with segregation of waste when really the issue is, of course, volume.
This takes me back to my CIOB Scholarship research, completed last year, from which the single most useful finding of my research was that the “power is in the production line” – or put another way: we need to empower those who are out there delivering the work to make better decisions that result in more sustainable outcomes. This simply can’t be achieved by sitting in front of a computer or reading a contract – it takes time and effort.
From time to time I get the feeling we’re pulling in the right direction but then I remember that we seem to have gotten way ahead of ourselves, looking far into the distance and obsessing over social media, drones and the circular economy and forgetting that buildings are built on conversations between people and not online. I’m no technophobe and I recognise that there are solutions there that can help us, but for all the glitz and the glamour of the London market, there’s a tail end of the industry out there that desperately needs bringing up to speed.
Churchill said: “A pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty” and I couldn’t agree more – we have a great opportunity here to improve the industry while the going is good and the answer to how is right under our noses. Sound management, positive relationships and a solid grip of the real issues at hand could help to turn 2015 into the year that made all the difference.
Ed Dixon is sustainability manager at Mace
