Acting on Climate Change
Green Building Council South Africa (GBCSA) welcomes and endorses the Climate Change Act as an important first step towards a comprehensive legislative and regulatory framework for action that will mitigate our contributions, and adapt our built environment, to the effects of climate change in South Africa.
What the GBCSA research desk is most excited about are some of the specific details that we think will have the biggest say in how impactful this legislation has the potential to become (see our first instalment on the Act in issue 27).
Tools for a sustainable future
The multiple mechanisms housed within the legislation provide a holistic and diverse range of tools to progress towards a sustainable future, as well as measure that progress and hold ourselves accountable for achieving it.
The mechanisms include:
- national, sectoral, provincial and municipal adaptation strategies and implementation plans;
- national and sectoral greenhouse gas emissions trajectories; and
- carbon budgets allocated for listed greenhouse gas-emitting activities. Carbon budgets are set amounts of allowed emissions and are usually designed to reduce over time towards a lower carbon paradigm.
Some of most important aspects of the Act will only be determined by regulation, and implementation plans. We still need to understand key details around the penalties for the listed offenses, and around the financial and administrative support for the measures, strategies and budgets to be developed, especially at a local and provincial government level. The specifics of those penalties contemplated is what will determine whether the Act has the teeth to be a deterrent to bad climate actions. Conversely, clear and pragmatic support for local and provincial governments is crucial for the Act to enable good actions.
Emission thresholds
The process of determining the listed greenhouse-gas emitting activities – and the thresholds for acceptable emission within those categories of activity – is also still to unfold.
These thresholds will determine the reach and impact of the Act in limiting emissions and speeding South Africa along its lowered carbon trajectory. They must be set carefully to avoid imposing unrealistic and damaging restrictions on industry, but in such a way that the restrictions are an effective tool in reducing our collective climate impact.
(a) must be expressed in carbon dioxide equivalents for carbon budgets and greenhouse gas mitigation plans and shall be applicable at company level based on operational control;
(b) must be based on the availability of feasible mitigation technology; and
(c) must take into account any opportunities and
constraints to implementation of policies and measures.
This is a mindful call to balance ambition (opportunities) with caution against unintended social and economic consequences (constraints) of a low-carbon transition.
It’s a challenging balance, but legislation that approaches it honestly and explicitly seems a sensible starting point.
We at GBCSA have seen local uptake, refinement and reinvention of climate-sensitive construction solutions in the green construction sector that give us great hope for a resilient future. The existing sustainable successes must inform our thresholds, trajectories and carbon budgets, as well as prudent caution around the risks inherent in change.
As a contributor to climate change of somewhere between 30% and 39% of total emissions (depending on the metric and sample set), the built environment is a significant greenhouse gas emitter. We cannot afford to overlook this sector’s potential to reduce our national emissions through transition to lower carbon construction techniques and buildings that are more resource-efficient.
Opportunity for more
There are opportunities for more than lowered emissions in the built environment too. Better buildings, in terms of green principles and resource efficiency, are also better environments to live and work in (read more here), and are better investments.
The expansion of our standard construction practice to become sustainable construction practice is underpinned by the creation of green jobs in design, engineering, project costing, project management, and where these roles come together – in green building certification.
It is these opportunities that we see in our daily work in the construction sector, that we hope the Act will nurture and support.
GBCSA looks forward to the detailing of the Act and its adoption as a map for South Africa’s low-carbon transformation towards a paradigm where both people and planet thrive.
