We recognise that environmental responsiveness is not limited to carbon and that a holistic approach to environmental and social sustainability should be encouraged. We have aligned ourselves to a number of initiatives and associations as a sign of our commitment to address climate breakdown and biodiversity loss including:
– Architects Declare
– RIBA 2030 Climate Challenge
– RIBA Sustainable Outcomes Guide
– LETI Climate Emergency Design Guide
– World Green Building Council’s Net Zero Carbon Buildings Commitment (NZCBC)
– Members of UKGBC
– Supporters of Part Z
JTP is committed to these initiatives and we work across the practice and all projects to deliver the ambitions of these plans. We have assessed our objectives against the above initiatives to create a JTP Routemap to 2030. As part of this work, 5 themed working groups were formed in 2021 to further our knowledge, experience and understanding across the sustainability topics and to enable us to continually raise sustainability performance standards in line with our zero carbon ambitions. These include the following:
- The Energy Working Group
- The Carbon Working Group
- The Biodiversity and Water Use Working Group
- The Health and Wellbeing Working Group
- The Post Occupancy Evaluation Working Group
The working groups set out objectives within our annual Business Plan to ensure we remain accountable.
We are a signatory of the World Green Building Council’s Net Zero Buildings Commitment and have committed to continue all owned and occupied assets being net zero carbon in operations using offsets, with the aim to reduce offsetting to a minimum by 2030. In order to do this, we are targeting reducing our GHG emissions as low as we can, in order to support the target to limit global temperature increases to 1.5 degrees Celsius, and offsetting the outstanding emissions. This requires us to reduce our GHG emissions by at least 43% by 2030 compared to a baseline year of 2019 and at least 60% by 2035. Our carbon footprint data is verified by a third party and we submit the data to the World Green Building Council annually for accountability.
The Net Zero Carbon Buildings Commitment focuses on Scopes 1 and 2. Our location-based Scopes 1 and 2 emissions have seen a reduction in our emissions, from the baseline of 2019, of 25%. In addition, we, as a practice, have committed to disclosing our Scope 3 emissions as well. With our Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions, we have seen a reduction of location-based emissions of 40% since our baseline year. Both of these reductions are significant progress in our goal of achieving a 43% reduction by 2030. We currently partner with Trees for Cities to plant trees, measured as equivalent to our annual emissions. The aim is to introduce biodiversity and improve quality of life in UK urban areas and also counterbalance our impact on the environment in the longer term whilst we continue to reduce our energy consumption.
As part of our Scope 3 emissions and in line with our commitments to the RIBA Climate Challenge 2030, we are collecting data on our key projects to report on progress in reducing carbon across the lifetime of our schemes. In line with LETI and RIBA Climate Challenge 2030, we are targeting reducing our Upfront Carbon on schemes with Whole Life Carbon Assessments to <500kgCO2/m2 by 2025, with a further reduction to <300kgCO2/m2 by 2030. In order to assist, we undertake carbon optioneering at design stages to understand the implications of our proposals at an early stage.
JTP Partner, Rebecca Taylor and Associate Director, Liz Liddell-Grainger, are responsible for championing the Practice’s approach to environmentally responsive design. They seek to promote environmental sustainability across the Practice and are available to assist in reviewing project-specific environmental considerations.
Furthermore, we have in-house expertise and experience in the following assessment methods:
- BREEAM Communities
- BREEAM for Refurbishment and Fit-out and for New Construction
- Building with Nature