The Environment Agency is embedding a new carbon and cost tool across its entire construction portfolio in a bid meet its 2030 net-zero ambitions.
The programme, developed with construction consultancy Aecom, integrates cost and carbon estimates within a single platform to help identify optimum sustainable solutions at the start of a project.
The first phase will be used to calculate capital cost and whole-life carbon, with later phases looking at whole-life cost estimates, integration with BIM, and supply chain data.
Once fully rolled out, the tool should enable the Environment Agency to consider whole-life assessments for both cost and carbon during investment decision-making.
Environment Agency project manager Alex Jones said: “By combining this capability into one platform we expect to benefit from faster estimates built around one consistent methodology with added transparency in the estimation build-up.
“We expect this improved transparency will help early supplier engagement and allow projects to assess options, reach optimal solutions and make better informed decisions earlier.”
Aecom’s Intelligence director, Tristan Harvey-Rice, said: “Bringing together carbon and cost data in this new way of working means carbon can sit at the heart of project prioritisation every single time.
“The tool makes huge amounts of up-to-date cost and carbon data very accessible, bringing efficiencies to the estimating process and crucially, enabling better informed decision-making around carbon.
“By adopting this new tool across all its projects, the Environment Agency is leading the way as public bodies across all sectors in the UK continue their efforts to cut carbon emissions.”
The tool forms part of the Environment Agency’s asset information management systems (AIMS) programme, which collates data held across the organisation.
It uses a centralised rate library based on information from industry sources, as well as the Environment Agency’s own historic project data.
Image: ConceptCafe/Shutterstock
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