An annual £22.1trn cost of resource waste is turning environmental sustainability in construction into a boardroom priority, pushing sustainable construction towards sustainable building design, sustainable design and eco-design for buildings that improve life cycle cost and cut the carbon footprint of construction. The strongest market signal is a sharper focus on whole life carbon, with whole life carbon assessment and lifecycle assessment increasingly used to measure embodied carbon, embodied carbon in materials and building lifecycle performance, supporting low carbon design, low embodied carbon materials and credible pathways to net zero whole life carbon and net zero carbon buildings.

In the UK, the Future Homes Standard, a faster Warm Homes Plan and electricity-market reform are making energy-efficient buildings, retrofit and electrified homes a compliance issue rather than a voluntary ambition. Record wind generation is strengthening the case for low carbon building by reducing the emissions attached to heat pumps and electric hot water, accelerating decarbonising the built environment. European plans to price incineration emissions reinforce a circular economy, especially circular economy in construction, resource efficiency in construction, circular construction strategies and end-of-life reuse in construction. BREEAM and BREEAM v7 are likely to gain further weight as investors demand sustainable material specification, environmental product declarations (EPDs), green building products and low carbon construction materials.