Sustainable Buildings Initiatives - Illustration

Carbon emissions and energy consumption involving the built environment have a lot of negative impacts on climate change, and architects are fighting together to control this through their building design and planning. This image shows what climate change does to our environment, which is on the right side. Global warming, sea-level rise, glacier melting, drought, storms, etc. are caused because of greenhouse gas emissions. On the left side, an architect is trying to stop it by trying out net-zero energy, and other sustainable building design strategies. But this is just a fraction of what needs to be done. Although this is just a fraction of what needs to be done, it could slow down the process at a rate that people hardly realize.

The report “Buildings & climate change: a summary for decision-makers” explains the buildings’ contribution to climate change and what architects can do to reduce greenhouse gas emissions through sustainable building practices. Buildings contribute to 40% of global energy use and 30% of global greenhouse gas emission. If we do not implement proper measures to slow it down, then greenhouse gas emissions will keep increasing in the long term. The building sectors need to follow the climate change strategies locally and globally to mitigate CO₂ emissions.

The podcast: “Fighting climate change, one building at a time” also discusses this problem and the possible solutions. Today’s buildings can use technologies that require less energy for heating and cooling. It can reduce the amount up to 90 percent. The latest materials can be used for new buildings, but older buildings could also be retrofitted or upgraded to achieve the greenhouse gas emission goals. However, it is challenging to bring all the changes even though architects are getting more and more aware of this situation because of the neglect of the world leaders, unaware clients, and greenwashing marketing organizations. Architects can only do so much. We all have to work together in this process to fight climate change.