Isra-Mart srl: Industry applauds minister's pledge to boost green construction

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Businesses have welcomed the launch of a joint government and industry action plan to decarbonise the built environment by 2050, but warned that a new panel tasked with scrutinising the sector must show strong leadership to be effective.

Business minister Mark Prisk today unveiled the action plan in response to a major report published by a panel of industry experts last November led by the government's construction tsar Paul Morrell.

The action plan forms the centre piece of today's response (pdf) and will be overseen by a new Green Construction Board, which will be chaired by Prisk and include Morrell. Prisk will chair alongside an industry representative who will be announced shortly.

The wide-ranging plan includes many pre-exsisting actions and commits three industry bodies to develop strategies to boost the low carbon construction sector.

The UK Green Building Council (UK-GBC) will publish a business plan in March 2012 to put the construction sector on course to cut emissions by 50 per cent by 2050.

The Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) will publish a route map in October this year, identifying what infrastructure will be required to meet the 2050 80 per cent carbon reduction targets.

Finally, the Strategic Forum for Construction will develop a sustainability accreditation scheme in summer 2012 for companies to commit to improving their environmental credentials.

Morrell said he was delighted that government had adopted many of the recommendations from the original report.

"To ensure that construction rises to the low carbon challenge we need to continue this new level of co-operation so I am also pleased that a joint government and industry board has been set up to ensure implementation of this plan," he said.

However, both the UK-GBC and the ICE warned that the new panel must show strong leadership to be effective.

Paul King, chief executive of the UK-GBC, said: "The Green Construction Board has the potential to play a pivotal role in joining up both industry and government activities. However, for it to be successful, it needs to have a voice – with a genuine mandate to shape the policy landscape and ensure that government is providing the right enabling conditions for industry to invest and deliver."

ICE president Peter Hansford echoed this warning, adding that it was crucial the board is led "by someone with significant standing within the construction industry and who commands respect among ministers and government officials".

A spokesman from BIS today told BusinessGreen that there has already been a great deal of interest from industry in joining the board, adding that the panel will be "forthright".

Employers body the CBI also welcomed the report but urged government to ensure both businesses and consumers take up the planned Green Deal incentive scheme.

Neil Bentley, CBI deputy director-general, said: "The CBI has serious concerns about the financing and take-up of the Green Deal, and we are calling on the government to stimulate both consumer and business interest."

The news came as London Mayor Boris Johnson today started a search for sponsors to help fund a competition for students to develop new energy reduction measures for buildings.

The Mayor will launch the competition in the next academic year, awarding at least £20,000 to the student at a London university who develops the best efficiency measure.

The Mayor also launched a fresh call for public-sector building owners to invest in the capital's RE:FIT scheme, which offers guaranteed paybacks from retrofitting measures.

Building retrofitting accounts for 41 per cent of the overall investment that the city requires to achieve the mayor's 60 per cent carbon cut by 2025. However, earlier this year it emerged that the capital is well short of its target to make 200,000 homes more energy and water efficient by 2012.