Towards a Low Carbon Design: A case study of an Industrial Building

Abstract

In construction industry a large amount of carbon dioxide is emitted due to embodied and operational energy. In order to reduce the carbon emission from buildings during the operation stage to mitigate the climate change impact, some low carbon and clean technologies should be considered. This study analyses the relationship between different carbon-generating activities and the carbon footprint for an industrial case study in the UK using Carbon Neutral Protocol. The research included data collection through networking and visual inspection in order to identify which activities produce the most carbon emissions and allow investigation for solutions to aspire to a future sustainable building and to achieve carbon neutrality. Results from this study showed that operational carbon, especially from electricity and gas are the largest contributor. Results also showed that CO2e from fossil fuel exceeded the standard benchmark for that type of building. Some clean technologies (solar, ground source heat pump) and energy efficient measures (fabric insulation) were suggested in order to minimise the emissions. The impact of these technologies have been modelled with IES-VE software in order to investigate each system size and potential saving. To achieve the carbon neutrality in the case study, the remaining carbon emission has been offset using an international renewable scheme, this requires the industrial building to pay a certain amount of money for each tonne they produced towards installation of any sustainable measure around the world