Introduction
The awareness of the relationship between greenhouse gas emissions and observed climate change and global warming has risen significantly over the previous 30 years. From initial scepticism and denial, globally more governments and business sectors have acknowledged and accepted that some action is necessary to reduce greenhouse gas emissions attempt to mitigate the perceived impacts of climate change( Stern 2006, Garnaut 2008). Policies and strategies have been debated and launched at all levels of government, and corporate social responsibility( CSR) has been taken up by some within the business community.
Construction, which involves the mining, extraction and use of resources, has a substantial environmental impact( Ortiz et al, 2009). The impacts of the buildings constructed vary in terms of the amounts of embodied energy, as well as, water and energy consumption during the building lifecycle. Specification of materials and the resources used in maintenance and repair has further impacts. The built environment in total is responsible for around half of all greenhouse gas emissions( Wilkinson, 2011), although estimates do vary from around 30 % to 50 % depending on what is included or excluded in the calculation. Overall the impact from the built environment is significant, and will increase with population growth and increased urbanisation of the world’ s population( RICS, 2015). Therefore the way built environment professionals perceive and understand the concept of sustainability is crucial to the implementation of meaningful actions to mitigate climate change.
It is said that sustainability is a contested concept; in other words it is interpreted or perceived differently by different actors; it means‘ all things to all men’( Söderbaum 2011, Washington, 2015, Cook & Golton 1994). If the concept is poorly understood, it follows that actions and practices may be ill-informed, misguided and ultimately will not deliver the much needed outcomes( Cook & Golton, 1994). To capture the views of those professionals who work in the built environment, this paper addresses the questions; what is the conceptual understanding of sustainability within built environment professionals and,( b) what is the implication of this level of conceptual understanding with regards to delivering sustainability?
The spectrum of sustainability; ecocentrism to anthropocentrism
Within the built environment a surfeit of terms encompass the concept of sustainability. For example, green, Green, greener, Gaian, ecological, environmentally sensitive, environmentally conscious natural, and sustainable design or building are some of the terms adopted( Wilkinson, 2012). Such variations beg the questions; do these concepts overlap or, are they the same? Are there shared aspects between the concepts and if so, what are they? Further, is the degree of‘ sustainability’ embedded within some concepts questionable? Moreover is it conceivable to consider a sustainable building in an absolute or a relative form? By this, it is meant; can a building be actually sustainable when considering the earth’ s total resources( absolute) or, is it simply more sustainable than a building to which is it contrasted( relative)? Currently building rating systems such as BREEAM, Green Star and LEED are regarded as being sustainable in an absolute sense. This research elucidates some of these questions. Currently,‘ sustainability’ is the preferred term and typically embraces economic, environmental and social considerations( Elkington 1997), although the term was defined initially in the Bruntland Report in 1987( WCED, 1987). The concept is further informed by political and philosophical notions, considered within the literature review, which exposed distinct attributes and sub-groups which needed to be de-constructed and ordered to
62 ZEMCH 2015 | International Conference | Bari- Lecce, Italy