Technology for Climate Action

The below article was authored by Sam for the Autumn 2024 edition of Landscape, published by the Landscape Institute.

Technology: the application of scientific knowledge for practical purposes, especially in industry.

Taking this broad definition of technology, which could span the digital, mechanical, material or biological and harnessing it to take a perspective from today, one might expect that the rapid advancement of technology this millennium and the explosion of knowledge spawned by the internet, would have spurred a great amount of progress for its use in sustainable development.

However, construction can be a slow beast to adapt and the landscape sector remains engrained in traditional construction methods used for many decades. In contrast, buildings and all the elements they are made of, have benefited from technological advancements, including Modern Methods of Construction (MMC) and advances in renewable technology which are making them cleaner and more efficient.

The Landscape Carbon Dilemma

The slow uptake of technological improvements in our industry may be attributed to the inherent perception that landscapes are simply nice, green and environmentally friendly. However, the hidden carbon costs of these projects often go unnoticed.

• Impact: The carbon impact of landscape development is a fraction of building and structural elements.

• Opportunity: The carbon reductions that can be made, with relative ease, are significant.

• The Dilemma: How do we balance the creation of biodiverse landscapes, active travel and neighbourhood regeneration while ensuring that the materials and methods we employ to create them do not impose an unsustainable environmental FEATURE cost?

Development is inevitable, so minimising emissions is crucial. While awareness of global warming is widespread within the industry, the intricacies of material choices and their carbon costs, along with the data on carbon sequestration through planting, are less understood.

Data Availability and Carbon Calculation Methods

First, let’s look at the current data landscape. If you are in the world of specifying and using materials in landscapes, some tools are imperative:

Key Data Hubs and Tools

• BECD: Building Environment Carbon Database.

• EC3: Embodied Carbon in Construction Calculator—a tool to calculate embodied carbon based on quantities.

• ICE: Inventory of Carbon & Energy.

• OneClickLCA: A proprietary tool for lifecycle analysis (LCA) usually undertaken by specialist consultants.

• Pathfinder (by Climate Positive Design): Distils data into digestible figures and allows for custom material uploads.

• Carbon Conscious App (by Sasaki): Focuses on large-scale land carbon analysis.

The Data Gap: EPDs (Environmental Product Declarations) are provided by suppliers to these databases, but often there is little information relating to landscape products. While paving units are common, there are few to no EPDs from plant or tree suppliers.

Manual Calculation and BIM Integration

Manual calculation is another method of carbon analysis. This can be undertaken using spreadsheets, or schedules linking to Building Information Modelling (BIM).

I have previously experimented with this successfully, managing to extract volume and quantity data from Revit models, then creating custom ‘Embodied Carbon’ fields using EPD data, or assumed averages where the data is not known.

Vectorworks Landmark has an inbuilt version of this called Vectorworks Embodied Carbon Calculator (VECC). Unfortunately, there remains little data around the carbon sequestration value of trees and planting. The growth pattern of trees and planting varies so much on location, climate and soil volume, but every effort should be made to understand this more.

The Landscape Institute’s Landscape and Carbon Steering Group is currently reviewing the best approaches to provide guidance for the industry on both embodied and sequestered carbon.

Strategies for Immediate Emissions Reductions

Making informed choices to reduce emissions involves a broad understanding of existing materials and alternative construction methods.

1. Material Reuse and Circular Economy

Using BIM models or manual drawing take-offs to calculate existing on-site materials can inform potential reuse.

• Examples: Reusing bricks in gabion baskets or repurposing paving into new patterns.

• Concrete: Crushing existing concrete for use in subbases.

• Case Studies: This way of working is highlighted in the work of architect Duncan Baker Brown and explored in the Pheonix project by Periscope and Human Nature.

• Digital Platforms: Building Material Exchange provides a digital location for trading excess materials, and European groups like Superuse have even created playgrounds from disused wind turbine propellers.

2. Advanced Surveying

Use of drone surveys for complex 3D scans, or even the Polycam app, can enable you to survey existing furniture, fencing, boulders, and walls to analyze what is on site for potential design integration.

3. Soil Management

Soil reuse is critical. Any disturbance of existing soil has carbon implications, and the emissions from transporting new soil can outweigh the benefits of planting trees. The University of Sheffield has explored using aggregates and recycled bricks for creating drought-tolerant, free-draining planting areas, as seen in the Grey to Green scheme in Sheffield.

Material Choices and the Role of AI

When specifying new products, the Material Triangle serves as a useful resource for comparison.

High Carbon "Culprits"ConsiderationsAluminiumHigh initial cost; check for longevity vs. steel.Galvanised SteelHigh cost; compare lifespan to weathered steel.GlassHigh cost; evaluate necessity vs. lower-carbon alternatives.

Time is an important consideration. Is it better to install timber fencing that lasts 20 years, or accept a higher carbon cost for something more robust that lasts longer? These nuances highlight the importance of standardized EPDs.

The Future: AI

AI could help us analyse EPDs and complex data much quicker, influencing project decisions. However, this technology is still in its infancy and can often misinterpret data it hasn’t been fully trained on.

Conclusion

Embracing technology in landscape architecture offers immense potential for reducing carbon emissions. By understanding and improving on these technologies and adopting pioneering practices, there are huge carbon savings that can be achieved with relative ease, creating a positive lasting impact for the climate.