Last month’s record-breaking temperatures brought climate change into daily life. People felt it in overheated classrooms, cancelled hospital appointments, disrupted journeys, sweltering workplaces and public buildings struggling to cope.
Climate change is already testing the buildings and infrastructure people rely on, and a warming world is already setting the conditions they must now withstand.
Our role is to help customers deliver projects that reduce emissions while responding to expectations around cost, risk, and performance – and to design buildings that are ready for the future climate.
A school, hospital or workplace completed today will still be in use in 50 years. Decisions made now on energy demand, fabric performance, overheating, flood resilience and systems design will determine whether that asset remains viable, affordable and fit for purpose.
This year’s energy price instability has underlined the commercial case. Buildings that reduce energy demand – particularly from fossil fuels – don’t just cut carbon. They cost less to run and are better placed to handle future shocks.
In May, the Climate Change Committee warned that the UK was “built for a climate that no longer exists”. June’s oppressive heat pushed buildings and infrastructure beyond the engineering assumptions built into their design. The risk is no longer just missing carbon targets, but delivering buildings that overheat, cost more to run, underperform or require early retrofit.
A well-designed school only delivers value if it stays comfortable in hotter summers. A leisure centre only supports council budgets if energy use is managed. A workplace that fails on comfort, health and efficiency will not hold its value – however well it was built.
We can already see what this means in practice. In a school, net zero carbon in operation can mean lower bills and more money available for pupils: at Tarleton Academy near Preston (below), verified performance is expected to save almost £50,000 a year.
In a leisure centre, where pools and sports facilities place heavy demands on energy, Eclipse Leisure Centre in Staines-upon-Thames (below) shows how Passivhaus design can improve comfort and climate resilience while keeping energy demand low.
And in an office building, 19 Cornwall Street in Birmingham (below) shows why performance is becoming part of commercial value — helping older buildings stay relevant as occupiers look harder at energy use, carbon and workplace quality.
Customers increasingly need support from early estate decisions through to performance in use — because buildings only deliver value when intent survives design, procurement, construction and operation.
That means designing buildings to use less energy from day one, using approaches such as Passivhaus, operational energy modelling, fossil-fuel-free heat solutions and renewables where appropriate. It also means checking how buildings perform post-occupancy, rather than assuming good design will deliver itself.
The question is not whether buildings need to be ready for a changing climate. It is what it will cost if they are not. A brilliant building is not simply one that meets the brief at handover. It is one that continues to perform in a hotter, more volatile and more cost-conscious world.
Designing and building net zero projects is not ideology. It is the practical business of building for the long-term to deliver future-ready assets that create lasting value.