Construction of our built environment is a significant contributor to carbon emissions, with the industry responsible for approximately 12% of all human emissions. It is essential that we take action to address this issue and work towards a decarbonised construction industry.

The ZERO initiative is an industry group focused on embodied carbon, which includes early project stages – extraction, processing, assembly, transport, and construction, plus later lifecycle stages of maintenance and demolition. Their goal is to raise awareness, share knowledge, and empower their members to make the changes needed to decarbonise the industry.

In this guest blog, ZERO elaborate on the work they do, as well as what to expect from them at DCW 2023, as our partnership with them continues for another year.

For the last 12 months we’ve been running a series of working groups, mostly via Teams, and recently through in-person workshops. We’ve gathered insight and project stories from a huge variety of contributors from our extended network. All of this dialogue and insight has been captured and will be shared openly in the coming months.

As part of this knowledge sharing, we are excited to announce that our ZERO Playbook will be released in March. The playbook consists of 60 modules, organised within pillars including leadership, design, construction, innovation, people, and measurement. Once released, we’ll welcome input, feedback, and case studies from around the world. We will be encouraging contribution at events, at in-person workshops, and online during our ongoing working groups via Teams.

“The ZERO Playbook is the portal into the ZERO community.  It is a platform within which people can come together to learn globally and then take pragmatic action on their projects today, no matter what role they play in the construction industry.  We are reaching into the pockets of excellence which exist across the construction sector ecosystem, and we are connecting this to a wider community, raising awareness and figuring out together what each of us can do to meet the challenge of reducing embodied carbon.  The Playbook is utilising recent powerful advances in AI to bring together the wisdom of the whole industry, allowing a global community to speak and learn in their language of choice.  At its core, we are building the Playbook to play its part in amplifying and accelerating the change needed to decarbonise the construction industry.”

– Jo Lucas, ZERO Co-founder

At Digital Construction Week this year, we will be supporting the Net Zero stage and technology village, interacting with the live playbook, and sharing the digital pillar with conference guests. We welcome all viewpoints and encourage attendees to challenge us and share their input and project stories.

“At DCW we will be highlighting the role technology plays in our industry’s decarbonisation efforts. We will also be connecting the DCW community with the solutions helping solve the carbon question in the ZERO technology lounge.“

– John Munkley, ZERO Co-founder

We have many plans for the year ahead, including events in the US, Dubai, Hong Kong, UK, and Australia. We will follow up the release of our playbook with working groups and special topic groups focused on a wide range of subjects including frontier materials, carbon leadership, procurement, mass timber, DfMA, concrete, insurance, AI, and digital working.

We invite all those interested in supporting our mission to join us where you will be invited to join our Discord, WhatsApp, events, and working groups.

“We need your knowledge, energy, enthusiasm, project experience, stories, and new ideas and solutions to change our industry. We look forward to seeing you at Digital Construction Week and working together to achieve a decarbonised construction industry.“

– James Bowles, ZERO Co-Founder and Chair