“No idea is more appealing”, wrote the Economist earlier in the year in an article about the Tory leadership, “than one which appears to offer not only an explanation for the grimness of one’s predicament, but also the possibility of escape from it”. The article was about tipping points.

The term derives from a mathematical insight known as geometrical progression and is most commonly used to help predict the speed at which epidemics of contagious disease are likely to spread but also for developments such as the spectacular explosion in mobile phone usage, or the fall in New York’s crime rate in the early 1990s. It could be a helpful lens through which to view the success we are having with our sustainability targets.

The idea is particularly topical because of the establishment of Margaret Beckett’s recent New Sustainable Buildings Task Group. “Clients” said Mrs Beckett, “must demand more sustainable buildings. Financial institutions must back developers. We need sustainability at the heart of our skills and professional training. We need architects and designers to incorporate .sustainability in their designs. Manufacturers must deliver efficient buildings services and fabric components. Builders must develop and market sustainable buildings, and we need consumers to demand those higher standards.”

We have been able to find few people in the industry that know anything about this new task group or what it is likely to say when it reports to government in February 2004, but that not withstanding, we wondered how helpful the idea of tipping points might be in getting the right sort of buildings build and moving towards the government’s very demanding sustainability targets more generally.

The debate was chaired by Terry Wyatt, Partner, Hoare Lea and Partners and President, CIBSE.

Speakers

Mark Whitby , Director of +Whitby, champion for carbon counting and an ICE past President. No Excuse

David Fisk , Professor of Sustainability, Imperial College and Chief Government Scientist, ODPM

Max Fordham , Director, Max Fordham & Partners and a CIBSE past president - Paper 3: Tipping Points

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Original debate notes

Action points generated on the night.

nCRISP report - Delivering a Low Carbon Economy

In recent years, clients have expected the construction industry to deliver performance. Consequently, they have been moving from input to output specifications — as with the PFI — on the assumption that the industry knows best what happens to its products.

But how much does the industry really know? As a general rule, it leaves the site as soon as possible after practical completion, does not live with the consequences of its actions, and is not much involved in providing aftercare services. Sadly, many construction professionals on the client side also behave in much the same way. Consequently, old problems persist, innovations miss their targets, and simple effective solutions are not appreciated for the successes they are.

In the new industry regime, one might expect to find much more feedback activity; and indeed there is a growing level of interest. However, to date most of the effort has been put into the processes of procurement and construction, not into how the completed product actually performs. Why?

Many clients assume that things should be right first time. However, as was debated at the Edge in October 2000, while there is much scope for improvement in performance and avoiding defects, the expectation of instant perfection is unreasonable in all but the most repetitive of projects. The customer needs the whole product, not just the physical bit.

Many clients assume that if they get the right people together in an integrated team, the feedback will happen automatically. In fact, you need both the ingredients and the recipe.

Nobody wants to bear the costs (although they are small, and almost certainly instantly repaid by the value added) and designers are fearful of the risks associated with discovering hidden problems (though these appear to be small too).

Effective feedback leads to benefits all round.

Chaired by Bill Bordass - William Bordass Associates and The Edge committee.

Speakers:

Barry Austin, Arup R&D, Monitoring workplace performance and feedback into design

Ashraf Michail, BP/Bovis Alliance, Alliances and knowledge management

David Adamson, Director of Estates, University of Cambridge. Soft Landings update

Mark Way, RMJM.

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Debate abstract

Debate background

Action points generated on the night.

This debate was set up to ask, Is the White Paper taking us where we want to go? Will it get us there and what does it mean for the built environment and distributed generation? Do we have any specific concerns and, if so, what should we be doing to register them, within our own companies, within the industry representative bodies and with government?

Chaired by Lord Ezra, former Chairman of the NCB Liberal Democrat spokesman on energy matters and Chairman of Micropower Ltd. National Energy Policy notes

Speakers:

Professor Bob Rowe, Leeds Metropolitan University

Professor Brian Smart, Department of Petroleum Engineering at Heriot Watt University; presentation link

Terry Wyatt, Partner at Hoare Lee and CIBSE President-Elect

Action points generated on the night

Chaired by Jan Hellings — Director of FaberMaunsell and member of the Edge committee.

Speakers:

Archie Galloway, Director John D Wood

Will Pank, Engineer, FaberMaunsell

Paul Velluet, Assistant Regional Director and Regional Architect, English Heritage London Region

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Debate notes