Balfour Beatty assesses eco costs
18 May 2022
An update on progress at Balfour Beatty’s Zero on Balfour Beatty’s zero carbon construction site project for the Edinburgh Biomes initiative at the city’s Royal Botanic Gardens, the infrastructure group highlights the importance of monitoring costs as well as environmental benefits.
As reported on the blog last October, the Biomes initiative includes improving the energy efficiency of the Garden’s iconic glasshouses and constructing new facilities to reduce the organisation’s carbon footprint, while providing a bio-secure propagation environment.
Recognising that an estimated 80% of the company’s carbon dioxide emissions are generated from its supply chain, Balfour Beatty is focused on reducing Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions associated with the construction phase of the project.
In doing so, the company will monitor emissions associated with its supply chain’s on-site activities, the embodied carbon of materials used, emissions generated from transport vehicles to and from site, as well as waste generated.
As advanced works at the site come to a close, in a recent update on Balfour Beatty’s ‘Spotlight’ blog, environment and sustainability manager Angela Pllu highlights the financial costs associated with zero carbon construction.
“Generally, we’ve found the upfront costs of lower carbon options to be considerably higher than more traditional methods – but of course, the costs can be recouped over the longer term through energy efficiency.”
This is another example of the argument that, although greener alternatives using new technology might carry a higher price tag because of the research and development costs behind them, they can achieve savings over the longer term. It’s similar to the arguments made for adopting low energy light bulbs a decade or so ago.
One of Balfour Beatty’s supply chain partners, Sunbelt Rentals has installed eco-friendly site cabins at the project and is helping to collect data on their performance to show the benefits the units can deliver.
