In 2023, we announced that by the end of this decade, we will only work on projects that meet our zero carbon design criteria. To monitor our progress towards our goal, we set an interim target of achieving zero carbon design criteria on 25% of our projects by the end of 2024. While we have made progress towards achieving this interim target through the delivery of our consultancy services and some of our design projects, the experience and feedback has highlighted the need to acknowledge the differing levels of influence and control Cundall can contribute through its consultancy and design services.
Since setting the Zero Carbon Design 2030 goal, changes in how targets are set and how carbon emissions are measured and reported have occurred and these vary across the industries and regions we serve. Therefore, to clarify the actions required to achieve our goal, we have refined our milestones as follows:
Milestone 1: by December 2024, we will continue to provide discipline-specific carbon emissions reductions guidance for clients’ consideration alongside Cundall’s consulting scope.
Milestone 2: by December 2027, we will report on and meet science-based intensity targets for our designs. This will relate to Cundall’s projects where we design something that exists temporarily or permanently.
Milestone 3: by December 2030, all our projects will meet our zero carbon design criteria aligned with science-based targets. This will include all disciplines involved in the project, not just those within Cundall’s scope.
Madlen Jannaschk, ESG Director, explained more: “Cundall was founded nearly 50 years ago on the ethos of sustainable design. We have experienced a cultural transformation in how we approach projects to embed designing for zero carbon as ‘business as usual’. Significant effort has been made in the creation of pathway tools and models to guide the process, as well as in the creation and collation of data for benchmarking and analysis. This has been, and still is, a huge task considering the availability and variability of data and metrics across all our disciplines and the regions we operate in."
Reflecting on the journey so far, Managing Partner, Carole O’Neil, explained: “We knew we’d set ourselves an extremely ambitious target and didn’t expect that changing the way we do business, as significantly as this, would be easy. However, Cundall accepted the challenge because rapid change is needed, and we are ideally positioned to be the catalyst. The consequences of failing to change, far outweigh any risks we see in failing to achieve our ambitious goal."
“We are learning along the way and will continue to collaborate with clients and our peer networks of design, construction, property development, facilities management, and real estate investment stakeholders, to navigate this difficult path to zero carbon design and strive for more resilient and sustainable buildings.”
“Our people have been the driving force behind the transition and achievements we have seen already. Their contribution towards our goal clearly demonstrates their dedication to Cundall’s, their clients’ and communities’ futures.”
Carole O'Neil
The buildings and construction sector are reported to be responsible for almost 40% of global carbon emissions. Therefore, as engineering consultants and designers, we understand the responsibility and opportunity Cundall has, to engage early-on in a building’s design journey, to instigate discussions on reducing emissions released through the design, construction, operation and the end of a building’s life, and go beyond the conversation about energy in use.
