Sustainable Construction In Public Buildings

The Commons Public Accounts Committee has a new report out on sustainability and government building projects.

It's a depressing read.

Mandatory environmental assessments were carried out in only 35% of new builds and 18% of major refurbishment projects in 2005–06, and only 9% of projects could be shown to meet the required environmental standards ... Departments did not undertake post-occupancy evaluations, which can be an effective way of identifying improvements, and did not carry out whole life costing which is necessary if the most sustainable option is to be chosen.

Labour's environmental rhetoric is bankrupt if this is the situation after 10 years in power.

The questioning of senior civil servants, Helen Ghosh among them, is welcomingly abrasive, further into the report (page 16 onwards).

The target for the government office estate (9000 buildings nationwide) to be carbon-neutral by 2012 is in jeoprady. If the government cannot achieve it within its buildings, civil servants, under questioning from MPs, said that they will "achieve" it by buying carbon offset. However, no extra money seems to have been put aside for this.