How Do We Support a More Sustainable Planning Objective; Sponsored by VU.CITY

The built environment contributes around 40% of the UK’s carbon footprint, how buildings are created & maintained must change.

Sustainability has long been recognised as a key topic in the planning sector but, with the recently released IPCC report, the immediacy of the global climate crisis is at the forefront of all our minds more than ever before.

The built environment contributes to around 40% of the UK’s total carbon footprint. The sustainability agenda stretches far beyond the energy efficiency of existing and new buildings. How do we tackle the issue of carbon embodied through construction? How to we adapt to changing and increasingly extreme climatic conditions? What measures should be standardised to create net zero buildings and cities?

As an industry we must ask ourselves what role we can each play; COP 26 is around the corner and a day has been dedicated to cities and the built environment. The session will explore how different sectors of the built environment professions continue to place sustainability at the centre of their objectives and help tackle the climate emergency.