In all the Nordic countries and Estonia, the green transition of the construction sector is high on the agenda, and development of building regulation concerning climate emission based on life cycle assessments (LCA) is ongoing.
However, methods, data and practices for regulating the climate and environmental impact of buildings are not yet well-established. Therefore, the Nordic countries and Estonia have a window of opportunity to collaborate, share knowledge and learnings and align approaches to ensure compatibility and comparability to a higher degree when each country determines and implements regulation.
The Benefits of Collaborating and Aligning Approaches
This alignment and collaboration between Nordic countries will ease the construction companies’ opportunity to offer low carbon solutions across the Nordics as methods and regulation on climate emission of buildings are compatible. Collaboration will also strengthen the knowledgebase and accelerate capacity building and competition across the sector.
Similar approaches, collaboration, knowledge sharing and common knowledge creation will also benefit policymakers in supporting each country’s climate ambitions in regulation and in creating a more solid basis for decision-making.
In addition, Nordic collaboration can also contribute with experience and knowledge to the relevant European policy development.
For these reasons, the Nordic and Estonian building authorities have collaborated and shared experience on methods for life cycle assessments and regulation of climate declarations in the latest years.
What do I Gain through this Roadmap?
The roadmap gives an overview of the current national carbon goals and time frames for introducing and developing regulation on climate emissions of buildings, and it outlines which modules are included in life cycle assessments in each Nordic countries. The roadmap also sets three strategic aims that pave the way for future collaboration on implementing climate declarations as a common starting point.
The three Strategic Aims of the Roadmap
Harmonisation and Implementation of Climate Declarations
This strategic aim strives to align and harmonise regulation for climate emissions of buildings through joint development of methods and supporting capacity building in the markets. Some of the initiatives include pursuing harmonisation of national implementation of EU policies that affect building regulations concerning climate emissions, and seeking common solutions to:
- Translatability of results and methods between countries
- Setting appropriate limit values
- Digitalised and LCA based on BIM-software
European Collaboration
In this strategic aim, the vision is to prepare for and contribute to the EU development of climate related policies and regulations and to make the Nordic region a frontrunner within low carbon construction. Some of the initiatives are:
- Map EU climate related policies, regulation, methods and initiatives
- Coordinate joint Nordic contribution to these EU policies as for instance Energy Performance of Building Directive (EPBD), Construction Products Regulation (CPR) and EU Whole Life Carbon Roadmap (WLC)
- Coordinate preparation for implementing the EU climate related regulations, including LCA requirements in the EPBD
Strengthened Authority Cooperation
The vision of the strategic aim is to continue and strengthen authority cooperation and to gain synergies by sharing knowledge and coordinating future development processes.
Initiatives include:
- Map national development of legislation, competencies and knowledge continuously
- Enhance collaboration with and between researches and define Nordic research projects
- Ease and support authority collaboration
Read Roadmap: Harmonising Nordic Building Regulations concerning Climate Emissions here