As an SE 2050 signatory firm committed to reducing embodied carbon in structural design projects to net zero by the year 2050, providing educational awareness of SE 2050 is critical. With so much information that is out there, we wanted to provide a list of the most frequently asked questions that we’ve seen come up.
Q1: What is SE 2050?
SE 2050 is abbreviated for the Structural Engineers 2050 Commitment Program. It is a program to advocate that structural engineers take action in lowering carbon emissions in the design of our structures and reduce the percentage to reach net-zero emissions by the year 2050.
Q2: Who developed the program?
It was developed by the Sustainability Committee of the Structural Engineering Institute (SEI) of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) and it was created to respond to a challenge brought to attention by the Carbon Leadership Forum (CLF).
Q3: Define embodied carbon emissions in simple terms.
Embodied Carbon refers to the emissions that are associated when extracting raw materials, fabrication, and installation of building materials. It is the release of carbon compounds into the atmosphere.
Q4: The term “net zero” keeps being mentioned, what is net zero?
In simple terms, net zero means that project materials DO NOT produce gas emissions into the environment. SE 2050, believes that net zero happens when the total impact of all components in the structural system adds up to zero embodied carbon emissions during its life cycle of transforming.
Q5: How can you take part in becoming a net zero firm?
The main objective is a collective effort from everyone in the company and includes, having an action plan of steps to achieve, continuous education with the resources that SE 2050 provides and/or finding resources, sharing and being an advocate, collecting data on projects and doing the calculations on how the materials are affecting the carbon emission percentages, reflecting on the actions that were taken and discussing ways to improve for the following year, and more.
Q6: What are the SE 2050 commitment program goals?
The SE 2050 commitment program goals include educating ourselves and the people we engage with, participating in sharing the data of our projects to the SE 2050 database and doing calculations on the Global Warming Potential (GWP) of our projects, sharing these calculations with other signatory firms or those who are curious about SE 2050, and advocating by continuously spreading the word of the program.
Q7: How can we calculate the Global Warming Potential (GWP) of our structures?
SE 2050 has already provided a large amount of software on its page for firms to select from on how to calculate a project’s GWP. This requires doing your research on what works with the company’s budget deciding on the appropriate software to find out the project Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and GWP and making a rollout checklist of all information necessary to calculate the project’s data.
Learn more about our SE 2050 efforts.
