The carbon footprint of Australia's construction sector

Abstract

Australia accounts for just 0.33% of the world's population yet it is one of the highest emitters of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions per capita in the world. The construction sector is a substantial area for mitigation efforts in Australia because of its economic importance and its involvement with indirect GHG emissions, i.e. those embodied in construction supply chains, including construction materials and electricity use. While the majority of policies and regulations focus on reducing direct emissions from buildings, more attention needs to be paid to the embodied emissions of the whole sector as these can take up anywhere between 10% and 97% of the whole life-cycle carbon emissions. This..