Marty Verry, Group CEO of Red Stag Group: Last month’s Economist magazine had two different articles quoting exactly the same figures; ‘7-8 percent of global emissions’. One related to the emissions of the world’s concrete sector, the other, the emissions of the world’s livestock sector.

This got me thinking; why has our government announced plans to introduce farm level emissions regulation, whilst abandoning plans to restrict the carbon intensity of building materials – of which concrete is the worst offender?

New Zealand’s international climate commitments will require emissions reductions by all sectors. So why should farmers subsidise foreign cement? Politically one would have thought the farmer lobby would have more pull with this particular government than the concrete lobby.

Last year’s green initiative bonfire saw the abandonment of MBIE’s planned ‘Building for Climate Change’ programme. It would have brought in the requirement to measure, then limit, carbon footprint of all new buildings. That would have forced material producers to de-carbonise, or face substitution. The initiative mirrors similar programmes globally and has strong local support.

Off the hook – at farmer’s expense

Most cement is manufactured offshore and as such is not touched by the ETS. This programme would have been the market signal that the concrete industry needed to de-carbonise. Now they are off the hook.  Why would they research and invest to decarbonise if there is no potential loss of market share or margin to justify the business case?  This is elementary business logic.

Stranger still is why farmers will face regulation, yet have few options to avoid emissions, whilst there are plenty of existing options to reduce concrete’s emissions should the government so incentivise.

Principle among the substitution options is ‘mass engineered timber’, according to Michael Barnard, a climate futurist, strategist, and author who published ‘Cement Displacement and Decarbonization through 2100,’ projecting the decade-by-decade change to the building and construction market over the next 75 years. Mr Banard is the Chief Strategist for the TFIE (The Future is Electric), consulting to billion-dollar hedge funds and multinationals.

In discussing alternatives Mr Barnard says “In my assessment, the largest of these is likely to be engineered timber,” adding that “structural strength is equal to reinforced concrete with a fifth the mass. Every tonne of engineered timber displaces 4.8 tonnes of reinforced concrete.”

Substitution with sustainable engineered timber would be no bad thing. It’s made locally, drawing from supply chains that reach deep into provinces like Northland, Bay of Plenty, East Coast and Nelson. There are plenty of employment, economic development, tax-take, and balance of payments reasons too.

A stronger domestic market would also provide the platform for scale investment in wood processing that could in turn help double the sector’s export earnings and lower construction costs locally. Modelling indicates there is over one billion dollars of likely investment in wood processing that could follow.

Smart targeted green building regulation required

So where does this leave our climate policy when it comes to the vast emissions from building materials? In our view the baby needs to be rescued from the ‘Building for Climate Change’ bathwater – but with modification.

One of the government’s hesitancies has been forcing designers to measure and report on embodied carbon. However, technology has caught up here. Plug-in design services such as V-Quest allow designers to measure a building’s carbon emissions, cost, and mass during design. It instantly populates the reporting MBIE wants, whilst the cost is insignificant.

The other reluctance is the burden of another building industry regulation. There is a simple tweak; the regulation should only apply to buildings that are likely to have significant carbon savings.

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