New roadmap paves the way for decarbonised precincts

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06 Apr 2022

Green Building Council of Australia today released a roadmap to decarbonise Australia’s precincts – setting a net zero goal for new precincts by 2030, and existing precincts by 2050.

Nick Alsop, GBCA’s Senior Manager of Market Engagement says the roadmap highlights that the precincts being designed now will have carbon impacts for generations, so it is important that the opportunities to reduce carbon are identified and acted on now.

“It’s becoming increasingly clear that low carbon precincts will be a powerful solution to decarbonising our economy,” Nick said.

“But we’re also excited by the other benefits that we see in sustainable precincts – they’re efficient, healthy, resilient and tread lightly on the planet. They offer developers the opportunity to demonstrate their commitment to sustainability, responding to the growing call to action that we are seeing from investors, shareholders and consumers.

The Climate Positive Roadmap for precincts defines the steps that need to be taken by all stakeholders to achieve the decarbonisation targets including:

  • embedding climate positive pathways into all stages of planning
  • committing to fossil-fuel-free precincts and ensure policy and planning processes support this ambition
  • removing the barriers to low carbon precinct energy solutions
  • driving lower upfront carbon in materials and construction activity
  • committing to delivering low carbon buildings in all precincts.

“We’ve seen some great examples of leaders in our sector already achieving these targets to drive carbon reductions in precincts that are now in operation and being enjoyed by communities,” Nick said.

“Our report highlights some of these precincts through case studies, and we’re really looking forward to continuing to add to this list as we see more sustainable precincts come to life.”

The Climate Positive Roadmap for precincts was launched as part of the GBCA’s TRANSFORM conference and can be found here. The case studies of sustainable precincts can be found here.