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In our obsession with newness, we can easily forget that the narrative of sustainability is not merely about technical longevity, but also about cultural sustainability, an expression of our city’s identity and thus a continuation of our collective memory of place.
NSW Building Commissioner David Chandler is making promises for change in 2020 that he intends to keep.
Developers and architects can plan a Living Building Challenge project, but it takes a builder to meet what is widely regarded as the world’s toughest green building test.
Landcom appears to be stepping up to its ambitious environmental targets with its new “sustainable community” at Glenfield, 36 kilometres south-west of the Sydney CBD.
Around 6000 people have signed-up to a database in Melbourne to rent apartments for five years, with an option to buy – complete with all the trimmings you need to build a great community.
Melbourne-based developer Lucent is branching out and taking its sustainable brand of apartments to the growing owner-occupier family and downsizer market in Brighton, 12 kilometres south east of the CBD
Mirvac is poised to deliver a $350 million exemplar of how to achieve net zero, high performance, energy efficient and affordable housing in Altona North in Melbourne.
There’s a great deal of anguish still to play out with people forced out of their homes but a new bill just presented to the NSW government looks like a good first step
On the global stage, there’s a renaissance in sustainability under way. Embodied carbon, waste and materiality are quickly becoming top of mind.
Social value can be up to 15 per cent of non-price assessments in construction tenders, but are the metrics genuine? If not, it’s a huge missed opportunity for this sector with so many multiplier effects in the economy.
Architect and broadcaster Peter Maddison calls out the “nonsense” of 6 Star Energy Rated homes with solar panels if the design is all wrong. Likewise the poor performance of most buildings.
The property market love affair with stone benchtops for bathrooms and kitchens is proving deadly for hundreds of Australian workers.
Thirty years after its inception, Passivhaus design, which results in high-performing buildings that use hardly any energy, looks set to hit the mainstream.
Builders and specifiers may need to check the labels on aluminium composite panels (ACPs) being supplied for building projects because of a proposed out-of-cycle amendment to the 2019 National Construction Code (NCC).
I recently attended a conference in the UK that discussed future trends affecting the global construction industry, and what struck me was the stark lack of consensus, clarity and strategy we have in Australia around the future of our construction and engineering industry, compared with many other countries.
In response to a recent report highlighting New Zealand’s problem with embodied carbon in construction, the head of a metal industry organisation Nick Collins has suggested carbon is only part of the story and that a wider approach is needed to clean up the construction industry, which includes a bigger role for the local metal manufacturing sector.
Having to pay high cumulative prices to find out what the rules are for construction doesn’t make sense. It’s like getting a licence and then having to pay to access each of the road rules. One of the comments on this story since we first posted suggests it just might be unconstitutional. It certainly feels unjust.
Comment: You could never accuse David Chandler of being a shrinking violet.
Rectifying an information and evidence shortfall in the now widely cited building and construction crisis needs to be an important part of improving policy making and regulation.
In July, Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews and the state’s minister for planning, Richard Wynne, trumpeted that $600 million would tackle Victoria’s high-rise cladding crisis. It was paraded as a safety solution for owners of affected buildings but the “fix” was a contemptible confidence trick.
The Daily Tele was shocked at how David Chandler’s articles in The Fifth Estate have been so critical of the government but he still gets the gig as building commissioner.
The most sustainable buildings are the ones we already have. How do we care for, maintain and creatively repurpose our most precious built environment assets?
UK construction firms have been figuring out how to prepare for a no-deal Brexit for some time, but now that Boris Johnson is PM, most are even more worried as orders are reaching new lows.
The fallout of this building crisis, at the end of the current property boom cycle, may see many developers close doors and get out of development activities.
The National Housing Finance and Investment Corporation has announced more than $85 million in finance for social and affordable housing across NSW.
“We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan. If he’d been talking of the building industry he might just have been right. Especially when you think how shonky it’s starting to look and especially when you think how big a part of the economy it is.
The European Commission estimates that almost 75 per cent of Europe’s building stock is energy inefficient, with a renovation rate of just 0.4 to 1.2 per cent per year, depending on the country. But several projects are racing to overcome the many hurdles to improving this. These hurdles are technical, economic, social and regulatory. Energy […]
The construction industry is normally fiercely in favour of low taxing governments, less red tape and anti-nanny state interventions.
Builder, designer and TV Host Barry Du Bois says the results of a school survey he took part in were “hideous”. Du Bois started looking at classroom design as part of a not-for-profit initiative he launched, Co-Innovate, which aimed to foster collaboration to solve big community problems. He contributed to CRCLCL research and to the […]
One of the big flaws in many schools is the poor thermal performance of existing classrooms, particularly during the increasingly hot summers.