Nathalie Bergvall, Director at JRA reflects on our latest half-day conference exploring the principles needed to build towards a sustainable future for all.

Just how circular is London? It’s a pressing question designers, planners and councils are faced with as part of the climate emergency and one that NLA tasked a group of experts to reflect on in light of their latest report at the ‘Scales of Circularity: Building Towards a Renewable London’ half-day conference.

Benjamin O’Connor kicked off the day by asking not only the question on everyone’s lips: ‘how circular is London?’ but if London, as a large and complex global city where space is always a premium, has the ambition and tools to adapt and evolve to become a fully circular economy.

Jemiliah Bailey started by setting out London’s Circular Economy Statement Policy and its objectives. The mayor and the GLA has the ambition to transform London into a global leader as a low carbon circular economy. Their aim is for London to be Net zero by 2030. To achieve this, all referrable planning applications from 2022 onward fall under guidance relating to circular economy principles, including a statement with a target of 20% recycled or re-used content. 

The discussions also centred around how these aims could be supported by architects and engineers, particularly due to their integral advisory role at early project stages. Sukriye Rae Robinson focused her talk on a new service by SOM defined as ‘Whole Life Carbon Accounting,’ which has been set up as a custodian of the Net Zero carbon commitments that developers need to deliver. The proposal is to track all aspects of Net Zero Carbon by maximising re-use, and minimising carbon upfront and in use, then back to re-use throughout the life cycle. The key take-away was that the performance gap between design stage predictions and as-built reality should be reduced. 

Steven Wilding’s presentation took a more micro approach using the ‘Heston in the loop’ pilot scheme in Hounslow, which focuses on embedding principles of circular economy into a multi-cultural neighbourhood. Measures include an eco-refill shop, repair café and various workshops all focusing on the circular economy. The scheme hopes to encourage local shopping, developing skills and job creation.

Alongside new approaches, much of the discussion, aptly, revolved around using what we already have. Michael Hynd touched on the targeted interventions that could be made at existing buildings by increasing NIA and massing. He is positive an old structure can function as ‘new’ with the right understanding of the structure. This is a sentiment that JRA shares, approaching retrofit as an interesting challenge, despite its complexity. The practice’s commitment is evidenced in swathes of successful refurbishment projects over the last 30 years. 

Gareth Atkinson and Sarah Trahair-Williams both offered case studies which demonstrated effective re-use. Atkinson noted the huge embodied carbon savings in re-using steel at 318 Oxford Street (formerly House of Fraser) and the ways his team collaborated with Trahair-Williams’ by donating steelwork to her site, the TBC building by developer FORE. Trahair-Williams was innovative in integrating the material into plans for the project, which was already on-site. Helen Newman of Fabrix also offered a case study of Roots in the Sky, a pioneering office development with London’s first rooftop urban forest. The project will also reuse some of the 139 tonnes of steel purchase by Fabrix from the demolition of 1 Broadgate. 

Their works set a precedent for change very much driven by innovative developers but as Julia Barfield noted, change is needed at scale, re-used steelwork and raised access floors alone do not a building make! Dr Colin Rose pointed to the London Circular Construction coalition which may resolve the current limitations. It has been set up to accelerate the shift towards a circular built environment and aims to start in December 2023.

As the morning came to a close, it was time to reflect on the new recycled aesthetic, the practicalities of a ‘loose design’ that allows for salvaged and ‘just-in-time’ materials, and how best to incentivise clients to follow circular economy principles when the guidance is in its infancy. On a personal level, it was also an opportunity to muse on what JRA can do to strive for greater circularity, even on sustainable retrofit projects and to take a moment to consider what might happen if we don’t.