Concrete is a versatile, durable and resilient building material that is locally available across Europe. What is more, concrete buildings can deliver the lowest overall CO2 impact. This is because, in order to realistically quantify the CO2 tag of a construction material such as concrete, it is important to look at the whole-life impact. This includes extraction of raw materials, production & transport, building in use, lifetime and durability, and end of life.
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Country: UK
Type: Sports facilites
Concrete was the material of choice for much of the infrastructure built for the 2012 London Olympics. For example, for the Olympic Stadium Precast beams supporting the lower tiers were cast on the stadium site, there is 9,250 m3 of precast concrete within the stadium bowl. This 'on-site prefabrication' method produced some very high quality finishes. The Olympic Stadium used pre-cast elements and recycled aggregates as cement replacement to achieve a sustainable and robust home for the Olympic Games.
With the aim of supporting sustainable property development, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the Europe Regional Network of the World Green Building Council (WGBC) have joined forces to work on improving energy and resource efficiency, whilst at the same time reducing CO2 emissions.
On 19 November 2015, the DG Environment publication "Science for Environment Policy" published an article concerning a study entitled “Carbon footprint comparison of innovative techniques in the construction and maintenance of road infrastructure in The Netherlands”.
