"What is needed now is courage"

Risk and uncertainty stand in the way of climate-smart building materials and technologies. This is according to Ylva Åborg, architect at FOJAB, who also leads the working group for materials within Klimatarena Stockholm. So how do you get past the fear of trying something new?

There is a lot to consider when designing and building a house. A plethora of different requirements, preferences, site conditions, economics, regulations, stakeholders. However, climate emissions have not been a factor in the equation until recently. The impact on biodiversity has only just begun to be discussed.

But now that we know what drives a building's carbon footprint, materials have emerged as one of the most important parameters. Greater knowledge and awareness of materials and how they are used is an important key to reducing emissions and achieving targets.

Will we see a plethora of more climate-smart materials in the future?

- Of course, it would be desirable to develop more locally grown façade or wall systems that use hemp as their main resource, for example. But above all, we need to start seeing what is already in use as our primary resource and use it as a resource bank. The single biggest issue going forward to lower the construction industry's carbon footprint is about materials extraction and manufacturing.

Reclaiming the given
This is according to Ylva Åborg, architect at FOJAB, who runs the working group on climate-smart building materials within Klimatarena Stockholm, a collaborative platform for the building and construction sector in Stockholm County that aims to accelerate the climate transition.

Seeing recycled materials as the given 'raw material' is an important paradigm shift that needs to happen, she says.

- Material suppliers need to make their business models more circular, and the EU Ecodesign Directive will force a huge shift. But we can't just shift responsibility to producers. Architects and other actors in the construction process need to understand the different life cycle lengths of materials and design for circularity with disassembly and products that preserve the integrity of the materials.

A life-cycle perspective on materials would also be appropriate when it comes to biodiversity. Biodiversity awareness has started to leak into projects, but solutions are still often at a local level, says Ylva.

- They are mostly about what can be done within each project or in the surrounding area. What can the farm offer, how can the roofs be used? In the case of wood, there is talk about the impact of forestry on the environment, but there is no corresponding discussion about other materials, how their production affects the site and what damage they do on the way here.

Risky to break routines
Paradigm shifts and system changes do not happen without friction. In a construction industry like the Swedish one, which is good at standardization, rationalization and repetition, it can be risky to break established routines. Large scale is good for business. Testing new things upsets the calculations.

- Risk is the biggest challenge we are dealing with right now in the Climate Arena Working Group on Climate Smart Building Materials. There is so much at stake. If it goes wrong, it can be very wrong," says Ylva, recalling the scandal with the single-stage sealed plaster facades in the 1990s.

Rewarding innovation
At the same time, she says, there is no other way than to try things out. "With known materials and technologies, we can halve climate emissions. To reach the rest, we need innovation and a market that demands change.

- Although many see it as business-critical to invest in climate-smart building materials, more financial support measures would be welcome. In Denmark, there is a fund structure that has contributed a lot to the sustainable transition, with funds that help manage risk and funds for training.

- But, she points out, what we need above all now are brave actors who dare to invest. Those who are able to respond to the major challenges of our time in both climate and environment, they will be relevant in the future. This applies to both materials and companies.