New report: How businesses can reduce carbon and create a sustainable built environment

edie, in partnership with Mitsubishi Electric, has published a new report exploring how businesses can reduce the carbon impact of their built environment and stay ahead of the 2050 curve.

As the UK’s 2050 net-zero deadline draws closer, businesses are facing increasing pressure to decarbonise their built environment. Buildings remain one of the largest and most significant sources of national emissions, yet progress in reducing these emissions continues to fall short of the scale necessary.

To help address this challenge, edie and Mitsubishi Electric’s report provides an in-depth analysis of the current sustainability landscape within the built environment, and delivers practical guidance on how organisations can meet their long-term net-zero goals.

The challenge of the built environment

The built environment represents a significant portion of the UK’s overall emissions, accounting for around a quarter of the total – and as much as 40% when including construction materials and operations. Each day, new development equivalent to the size of Paris is added globally, creating further pressure for businesses to make meaningful, positive change.

Despite this, progress on decarbonising buildings has been inconsistent. While the UK has achieved improvements in operational energy efficiency, major gaps remain in tackling embodied carbon: the emissions associated with materials, construction and maintenance. Currently there is no national policy or regulation specifically designed to limit embodied carbon, meaning that leadership in this area must increasingly come from the private sector.

edie’s report, titled Greening the built environment: Keeping to the 2050 curve, sets out how businesses can meet national climate goals and take action on integrating emissions reduction across every stage of the building lifecycle. This includes rethinking how assets are designed, constructed, operated and retrofitted, and ensuring that sustainability considerations are embedded within procurement, investment and long-term planning.

Download the report here