Requirements set by Swedish municipalities to promote construction with low climate change impact

Abstract

This study investigates how Swedish municipalities work to reduce the climate change impact of building construction. It focuses on current practices related to promoting the use of sustainable construction materials and on barriers to environmental requirements in construction, in particular environmental performance requirements based on LCA procedures. Municipalities were surveyed about the existence of municipal policies dealing with environmental issues in construction, the knowledge level about these issues, and the measures and requirements used to promote materials with low climate change impact. The survey was followed by semi-structured interviews about current practices and barriers to environmental requirements in construction. Results show that large municipalities are more likely to have dedicated policies and implement more measures than their smaller counterparts. However, willingness to implement future measures and knowledge of sustainable construction do not vary significantly with municipality population. Efforts are often limited to procurement, municipal construction projects and discussions with stakeholders. When requirements are set, they are almost always based on prescribing a technical solution (e.g. use of timber) rather than assessing environmental performance (e.g. calculating greenhouse gases emissions with a LCA tool). Measures that municipalities can take as public authorities are restricted by the law, which remains ambiguous as to the legality of environmental performance requirements. Legal issues, limited knowledge and resources appear to be the main barriers to environmental performance requirements in construction. A strategy is proposed to overcome these issues. After setting appropriate targets and securing resources, the municipality should establish dialogue with developers and constructors. It should then require them to provide inventory data for new construction projects. The municipality should make sure appropriate guidance and standardised methods are available. Information requirements should be strengthened over time, and practitioners should progressively become familiar with data collection and LCA methods. When data and knowledge gaps are filled, the municipality can set environmental performance requirements for new buildings.