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To help speed up the decarbonisation of the real estate sector, The Chancery Lane Project (TCLP) was born.
TCLP is a non-profit organisation that facilitates events during which lawyers of different disciplines collaborate to create practical clauses in legal contracts that deliver climate solutions.
At present, 149 organisations – including law firm Addleshaw Goddard – contribute to TCLP, and the clauses are peer-reviewed to make sure that they are of high quality and technically accurate.
“Legislation is great, but it takes too long and we don’t have the luxury of that time,” says Becky Annison, director of engagement at TCLP. “We’re not waiting for legislation. We’re not waiting for case law. We’re identifying an issue that exists, and going out and fixing it with drafting.”
While the drafting and inclusion of climate-friendly clauses in contracts is an important part of efforts by the wider industry to speed up decarbonisation, there are many other things that need to happen to move the dial.
Cleaning up the supply chain is one of them. Gareth Poole, director of contract services at Turner & Townsend, points out that there is currently a lack of understanding surrounding the supply chain.
“To address net zero, you can’t set specific decarbonisation targets in isolation,” he says. “We need to look at how it accounts for carbon reduction as a whole across the supply chain. I think it’s really important that we look at it collectively, holistically through the supply chain and how they engage contractually.”
We’re identifying an issue that exists and fixing it
Becky Annison, TCLP
Poole has also identified a need for greater engagement with the supply chain.
“The client doesn’t always engage with the supply chain early in the development of a project to really allow the supply chain to identify what the appropriate innovations or emerging technologies are. Without that effective planning, we’re not offering the supply chain the ability to really advance.”
He adds that clients also need to ensure a wide understanding of what their corporate view is on net zero, how they will achieve it and what their route is over a period of time to get there.
Companies’ commitments to their sustainability targets and their historical reluctance to include green lease clauses in contracts are other issues that need to be addressed, with some balking at the upfront costs. However, experts draw attention to research that shows the investment pays off more quickly than people realise.
“Over the lifetime of the building, once green provisions are put in place, you should save money because if [buildings are] more efficient, they use less energy. You save money in the long run,” says Oliver Chamberlain, head of real estate at Hogan Lovells.
Chamberlain notes that while green lease provisions were formerly often negotiated out, a change in attitudes is now driving more environmentally responsible behaviour.
Annison agrees. “The pressure is building up,” she says. “The momentum is building and it’s moving beyond rhetoric into assessments and KPIs and common standards of reporting.”
This thought is further echoed by Andrew Waugh, founder and director at Waugh Thistleton Architects.
“Investors are driven by shareholders and the shareholders want green investments,” says Waugh. “Every investment company, every pension fund is requiring an environmental, social governance policy to their fund. They’re saying to developers: ‘We will only invest in green buildings.’ Therefore, the developer is having to make changes and [is] requiring architects to make those changes for them.”
In terms of the role architects need to play, Waugh stresses they need to go further than merely performing to brief and legislation. Architects need to think about the design of their buildings and how climate conscious that design is, he says.
“In our practice, we call it resource-conscious design,” Waugh adds. “It’s not about doing what you want and then trying to make it fit the regulations. It’s about an ethos of design that from the very beginning is about thinking about resources, energy use and how the building can be adapted, reused, recycled and demounted in the future.”
He says that architects need to think more about upfront carbon as that – in addition to building materials and the construction process – makes up the major burden in the journey to net zero.
We lag behind the rest of Europe in legislating against embodied carbon
Andrew Waugh, Waugh Thistleton Architects
“Architects need to think: ‘Can I build from recyclable, reusable, replenishable materials like timber or easily recyclable materials like zinc? Do I need to have a building that is 200m tall? Is that efficient and good for our planet? Or should I actually be thinking about lower, denser buildings?’”
Research backs the viability of alternative construction materials and the positive effects that switching from traditional materials could have.
A study published by nature.com titled Buildings as a Global Carbon Sink states that making 90% of new buildings from wood, rather than concrete and steel, could cut global carbon dioxide emissions by 4% – more than the total climate footprint of flying.
Across the sector, experts agree that to really tie these efforts together, there needs to be more government legislation.
Richard Wade, partner at Blake Morgan and head of the law firm’s construction group, says: “We’re going to move at the pace of the slowest unless it gets legislated for. The clean-up of the supply chain is largely going to have to be driven by regulation and legislation.”
Proposals made by Wade include the incentivisation of renovation and regeneration, particularly on brownfield sites and urban inner-city sites, as well as changes to the VAT regime, which would encourage clients to build sustainably on those sites.
Waugh agrees. “We need far more legislation around embodied carbon. We lag behind the rest of Europe in terms of legislating against embodied carbon. The production of cement is one of the singular most carbon-intensive processes that we undertake in the world. Nearly a quarter of our emissions in the UK are down to construction. It has to stop.”
In order to drive meaningful change, the government needs to set down firm regulations for the industry as a whole. If everyone is required to comply with the same rules, then everyone will move forward at the same speed.
But while governmental processes are set in motion and chug slowly down the path, more people within the sector need to take it upon themselves and do their bit to protect the planet before it is too late.
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