WSP’s carbon halving commitment by 2030 will be compared against 2020 numbers.
Decarbonisation programme director Robert Lyall says the method that's been developed involves analysing a large sample of projects from 2020 – using carbon calculators to measure environmental and carbon impacts across their construction lifecycle stages.
“The robust nature of our sampling process will give us high statistical confidence of the carbon dioxide equivalent impacts of our 2020 projects.”
The sample projects were compiled in Q2, and measurement process begun in June. To mitigate sampling bias, approximately 200 projects are planned to be measured – representing the diverse projects that WSP undertakes across transport, water, property and buildings, earth and environment, and power sectors.
The aim is to have between sixty and eighty projects measured by the end of Q3 with the balance analysed by the end of the year.
“To measure our progress against our commitment, we must baseline. Alongside upskilling and training our people to design and advise with lower carbon alternatives forefront of mind, achieving quantified numbers will be hugely beneficial,” says Robert.
"Developing a consistent methodology for measuring the carbon impacts of our designs and advice has been complex. The devil's been in the detail, but baseline data for our 2020 project designs is now being generated across all WSP sectors.
“Data now being generated will provide measurable benchmarks for future projects, letting us, for example, compare the carbon impacts of current projects, with those in 2020.
“Our approach includes a train the trainer model - letting us build a team of carbon impact assessors, reviewers, and verifiers throughout WSP.
"Challenges include moving from manual to digital carbon measurement processes. We also need to consolidate and refine the number of carbon calculation tools that we use internally. But, a year and a half in, we're well on track with our decarbonisation commitment."
More information about WSP in New Zealand's commitment to reducing the carbon footprint of infrastructure designs and advice by 2030 is here.
