
Views • 17/01/2025
Building in our net zero ambitions
In this article, MAPP Building Consultancy’s Associate Director – ESG Projects, Giulia Jones, shares her perspective on how we can join up our approach to net zero, both at the organisational and industry level.

After another record-breaking European summer followed by deadly flooding in Spain, it’s clear that climate change is no longer a distant threat. All of us in the built environment need to integrate climate risk and adaptation into our asset strategies now, if we are to remain resilient in a rapidly-changing climate.
Most companies remain committed to net zero carbon (NZC) strategies. However, the pressure to demonstrate progress against interim targets is on. Many are targeting a ~40% reduction by 2030 (compared to their baseline year). Without a clear roadmap, these targets might never make it off the slide deck.
Organisations need to approach this challenge as one unit, rather than the sum of all their specialisms. With a holistic and strategic approach to sustainability and building decarbonisation, we can transform plans into actions.
Talking with clients about net zero, one topic consistently takes centre stage: building decarbonisation. Whilst clients are committed to reducing emissions, practical challenges such as the logistics of undertaking a retrofit project in an in-operation building, often complicate things. Despite these complexities, eliminating gas from buildings is non-negotiable if we are to reduce emissions in our sector.
Successful decarbonisation strategies require an approach that balances existing building constraints, capital expenditure and operational costs against the added value of the interventions needed to remove gas.
Strategies also need to consider the cost of inaction. Buildings that are not upgraded to meet environmental standards could significantly depreciate due to both regulatory and physical climate risks.
Smarter maintenance and improvement plans, like timing works for when equipment reaches the end of its life, can minimise capital expenditure. Project schedules should also consider lease renewals, fit-out works and occupier projects, to minimise disruption.
Wherever possible, gas removal should be paired with efforts to improve building fabric and increase on-site generation, such as rooftop solar systems, to help improve the project viability by reducing the building grid-energy demand.

Embodied carbon: The bigger picture
Making buildings truly sustainable is impossible without tackling embodied carbon. Often overlooked, it refers to emissions from the extraction, manufacture and transportation of materials into a building. According to the UKGBC, embodied carbon accounts for nearly 20% of the UK’s built environment emissions. However, data is limited, and the true figure is likely higher. Given that 80% of our 2050 building stock already exists, reducing the embodied carbon of refurbishments and fit-out projects is a must for cutting emissions.
To date, understanding ‘what good looks like’ when it comes to embodied carbon has been very difficult. The new Net Zero Carbon Buildings Standard has created a standardised definition of a “net zero carbon” building and increased the availability of comparable data. This creates a great opportunity for industry leaders to validate their efforts and set a benchmark for others to follow.
Data: The foundation of sustainability
Emergent technologies, from ‘Internet of Things (IoT)’ to AI and digital twins, tend to grab headlines. However, as well as investing in these new technologies, we must understand how our buildings are performing. To do so, we cannot overlook the basics of building energy, water and waste data – after all, you reduce what you measure.
Our ESG Data team, which works closely with our Sustainability and Building Consultancy teams, provides real-time data crucial for reducing the building energy performance gap. To address this gap, we need to understand what is driving the differences between modelled and actual building consumption. Building and facilities managers need in-depth training on their specific building systems, including how they have been commissioned and how to spot if they aren’t operating as intended. At MAPP, we flag unusual or above-average consumption data in our reporting and work with site teams to uncover the causes and how we can develop and implement solutions that will work.

MAPP has a varied and complex network of clients and assets to manage, each with its own quirks, needs and priorities. To help them all achieve their sustainability and net zero ambitions, we need to become “stubborn optimists”. The belief that we can, and will, meet our climate commitments is the first, most important item to tick off. To succeed, however, we and the rest of the industry must act now to integrate our approach to building decarbonisation and sustainable project delivery.