Cerclos is helping asset owners and their advisors to tackle the construction industry’s carbon footprint as we collectively move towards ambitious and fast-approaching emissions reduction targets.
With the construction industry responsible for more than a third of the world’s carbon footprint, there is an urgent call to significantly reduce environmental impacts as 2030 and 2050 targets draw nearer.
For more than a decade, Cerclos has provided Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) technology and expertise that save both time and carbon. This approach provides organisations a comprehensive picture of carbon emissions for projects of diverse sizes and complexities to inform important decisions from early conceptual stages through to construction, operation and beyond.
Their flagship software, eTool, serves as a collaborative platform that empowers teams to assess and reduce emissions throughout the entire asset lifecycle, enabling innovative sustainable design strategies that meet and often exceed targets.
Cerclos also offers a unique third-party verification service that helps eTool users in reviewing and certifying LCA studies aligned with international standards and rating schemes providing an additional level of assurance for their customers.
Chairman and co-founder of Cerclos, Alexander Bruce, said making informed design decisions early on by utilising LCA software is the key to reducing carbon emissions and making long-lasting environmental impacts on our planet.
“Achieving decarbonisation goals and doing it in a quantifiable, meaningful fashion with real data, aligned with international standards is vital. It is important that what you’re doing is repeatable, auditable and reportable, to not just yourselves but to your other stakeholders,” Mr Bruce said.
Cerclos has built a world-leading reputation as a trusted partner for top-tier customers and high-profile projects worldwide, from Perth where the company was founded, to Australia’s east coast and further abroad to New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and even Antarctica, where Cerclos provided expert LCA input into the design of New Zealand’s sole Antarctic research station, Scott Base.
Across these diverse jurisdictions, Cerclos’ portfolio includes projects ranging from large-scale infrastructure developments to commercial buildings, skyscrapers, shopping centres, and housing projects – reducing emissions by more than one million tonnes, to date.
Cerclos has contributed to major infrastructure projects close to home, including Perth’s METRONET, WA’s single largest public transport investment where, eTool was used to model whole-of-life carbon emissions at various stages of the infrastructure design and station building over the Lakelands train station’s 120-year lifespan.
Over in New Zealand, the public housing government authority, Kāinga Ora, utilised Cerclos’ latest technology, RapidLCA – specifically used for low-to-medium density housing – to transition toward carbon neutral public housing and construction practices while achieving its government emissions reduction targets. RapidLCA is a fast, intuitive, affordable and enterprise-ready app, accessible to non-LCA professionals to manage housing portfolios with ease and transparency.
Cerclos has emerged as a key player further abroad, involved in a landmark infrastructure project in the UK, the £98 billion high-speed HS2 railway, which connects major cities. Since 2018, the HS2 project has utilised eTool as the chosen LCA software to assess and develop design options to meet its net zero target.
Throughout the project, HS2 subcontractors have worked in partnership to improve the life cycle performance using eTool’s collaboration platform that enables multiple users to work together on complex assessments with a broad range of stakeholders.
Mark Fenton, HS2’s carbon manager and technical services director, said eTool enables tangible and sustainable innovation that sparks the right conversations about reducing carbon and striving for net zero targets.
“eTool increasingly has more data in it that we can use as a baseline and gives us the capability for the designers to optimise their designs, linking into Autodesk and other CAD-based models,” Mr Fenton said.
Through its innovative LCA technology, Cerclos is aiming to achieve 10 million tonnes of carbon savings over the next few years. This is approximately equivalent to revegetating 50,000 hectares or 28,000 MCGs (or 30,000 Optus Stadiums).
“With the right tools, and the right approach, the target is achievable, and Western Australia can be recognised as a leading hub for carbon emissions reduction,” Mr Bruce commented.
“Let’s provide meaningful data to drive meaningful results on our journey to net zero.”
With a collaborative approach, powered by accurate data and accessible tools, we can make the low-carbon buildings and infrastructure a reality.
