The growing green voices

The new building regulations and a government-driven code for sustainable buildings is just the start. Voices for more radical change are getting louder. This week saw the appearance on these shores of former US presidential hopeful Al Gore, preaching his radical message about how urgently the world needs to act to avoid future disaster. UK figures such as environmentalist George Monbiot, who writes this week in the Guardian about the woeful lacking of checking how efficient our new houses are, are also becoming more prominent.

Monbiot calls for the UK to follow Germany's lead by building the Passivhaus model, which produces heat by sunlight coming through the windows rather than using radiators.

This brings me neatly to just how far behind our industry is compared to our continental neighbours in both environmental and efficiency terms (see news across). We are building at least a quarter less productively than the best nation across the Channel, Belgium, according to a new report produced for the EU by Bernard Williams Associates. How we can we readily embrace the green agenda when we are failing to perform the basic task of putting up buildings up in an orderly, planned way with the minimal amount of skilled workers?

The two - efficient buildings and efficient performance - are obviously linked. I'm not sure whether anyone has yet uncovered the carbon footprint that UK constructions' waste is creating, but I reckon it's a pretty scary amount. Gore argues that the environmental issue is not just political, but moral. If that's the case we need to be facing up to a pretty stark failing. The industry needs to wake up both to its own performance, and the performance of its buildings, urgently.