Sustainable Design and Embodied Carbon

The podcast episode discusses the importance of sustainable design and embodied carbon. The guest, Ethan Vogel from HGA Architects and Engineers, highlights the need for structural engineers to consider the environmental impact of their designs and advocates for the use of mass timber as a more sustainable alternative to steel and concrete. He mentions the SE 2050 challenge, which encourages engineers and architecture firms to commit to reducing and eliminating embodied carbon in building structures by 2050. Ethan emphasizes the importance of early involvement of structural engineers in the design process and mentions the inclusion of sustainable design strategies in project narratives and specifications. He also discusses the potential for performance-based specifications, design for reuse, and addressing thermal bridging in building design. While there is a lack of industry standards, he suggests using tools such as the SC 2050 e-COM tool, Tally, One Click, and Payette's Colidoscope to assess embodied carbon and make more sustainable material choices.