Shady Green Credentials

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Ever wondered what is common to the real estate and the automobile industries? 

Post purchase trauma? No.

Carbon emissions, aka pollution. Yes, real estate has one of the highest carbon footprints of any sector. As you read this email, the sector is contributing 30% of global annual greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, while consuming around 40% of the world’s energy, per the UN Environmental Programme.

Self-regulated Environmental Standards

Globally, real estate neither seems to be regulating its emissions, nor paving a pathway to net zero in any coordinated manner whatsoever. Essentially, its a free-for-all. 

If you analyse the latest project launches, you will know that most environment concerns shown in the project brochure (if any at all) are mostly hollow promises. Add to that real estate companies that are focused on metrics of their choosing in an attempt to claim they are making a positive environmental impact. 

Operational and Embodied Carbon

Read the available sustainability policies of real estate companies and the focus is always on ‘operational’ carbon rather than on the ‘embodied’ carbon. This is the highway your mother told you to avoid at all cost. 

Operational Carbon - Emitted during the daily usage of a property, from actions such as taking the elevator, lighting and air conditioning. 

Embodied Carbon - Emissions created during the manufacturing of materials required to construct the property. The key components of any construction in India are concrete and steel, both of which produce significant carbon emissions. 

Embodied carbon is expected to represent 74% of total emissions from new buildings between 2020 and 2030 and 49% of the total emissions between 2020 and 2050, per the UN report. Also note that this ratio is only going to increase as the energy grid becomes increasingly decarbonised with the rise of renewable energy sources like wind and solar power. 

What Then?

A few ideas are doing the rounds, like doing a necessity test before constructing new real estate to see if it is really important to build it, or refurbishing old buildings in city centres using modern restoration techniques to reduce the use of concrete and steel. 

Ideally, the most sustainable and green building is the one that is never built. Till then, we can only hope that just like Bharat 6 had auto manufacturers scurrying to fall in line, we enforce emission norms for construction before it's too late.