A Study on Life Cycle CO2 Emissions of Low-Carbon Building in South Korea

Su-Hyun Cho,Chang-U Chae

doi:10.3390/su8060579

Abstract

There have been much interest and many efforts to control global warming and reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions throughout the world. Recently, the Republic of Korea has also increased its GHG reduction goal and searched for an implementation plan. In buildings, for example, there have been technology developments and deployment policies to reduce GHG emissions from a life cycle perspective, covering construction materials, building construction, use of buildings and waste disposal. In particular, Korea’s Green Standard for Energy and Environmental Design is a certification of environmentally-friendly buildings for their energy saving and reduction of environmental pollution throughout their lives. In fact, the demand and adoption of the certification are rising every year. In construction materials and buildings, as a result, an environmentally-friendly aspect has become crucial. The importance of construction material and building development technologies that can reduce environmental load by diminishing GHG emissions in buildings has emerged. Moreover, there has been a rising necessity to verify the GHG reduction effects of buildings. To assess the reduction of carbon emissions in the buildings built with low-carbon construction technologies and materials, therefore, this study estimated life cycle carbon emissions in reference buildings in which general construction materials are used and in low-carbon buildings. For this, the carbon emissions and their reduction from construction materials (especially concrete) between conventional products and low-carbon materials were estimated, using Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). After estimating carbon emissions from a building life cycle perspective, their reduction in low-carbon buildings compared to the reference buildings was reviewed. The results found that compared to conventional buildings, low-carbon buildings revealed a 25% decrease in carbon emissions in terms of the reduction of Life Cycle CO2 (LCCO2) per unit area. If diverse production technologies and sales routes are further developed for low-carbon construction materials, carbon emission reduction effects would considerably increase.

Highlights

At the recent 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP 21), which was held in Paris, France, the ‘Paris Agreement’, a new framework convention on climate change, was adopted
Among the assessment methods mostly used during Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) to assess the Life Cycle CO2 (LCCO2) emissions of buildings, process analysis [35] was adopted
FFigiguurere33. .CCOO22eemmiissssiioonnddiissttrriibbuuttiioonn ooff tthhee wwhhoollee bbuuiillddiinngg dduurriinngg tthheemmaatteerriiaallpprroodduuccttiioonnpphhaassee The CO2 emissions by common area, residential house and empirical house are estimated as showThneinCTOa2belem9isasnidonFsigbuyreco4m. mon area, residential house and empirical house are estimated as shown in Table 9 and Figure 4

Summary

Introduction

At the recent 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP 21), which was held in Paris, France, the ‘Paris Agreement’, a new framework convention on climate change, was adopted. There has been a rising interest in it for a proper response to a post-2020 climate framework around the world. The Republic of Korea announced a voluntary action plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 37% from the business-as-usual (BAU) level of 851 million by 2030 [1]. There have been many efforts to reduce GHG emissions throughout the industries. Businesses have operated a “GHG and energy target management system” and cap-and-trade to control GHG emissions. The Green Standard for Energy and Environmental Design (G-SEED) has been applied to find ways for reducing GHG emissions considering the life cycle of the green buildings that have reduced GHG emissions with the use of environmental load-reduced materials

Objectives

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion