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Building Decarbonization: A People and Pocketbook Issue

Dr. Michael Shank
4 min readAug 18, 2024

BY DR. MICHAEL SHANK

As governments across Europe finally start tackling the outsized carbon footprint associated with the built environment, responsible for roughly 40 percent of all global greenhouse gas emissions, there’s something often overlooked that could aid or obstruct this decarbonization effort. It’s public perception.

Currently, building decarbonization receives just one-third the media attention that transportation decarbonization receives, despite being well over twice the carbon footprint. Vehicle emissions may be more obvious to the public, but building emissions in the making and operating of them are far more substantial.

What the public thinks about what’s currently happening to buildings matters immensely, then. Because it’s the public that’ll need to support the policies required to ensure the built environment isn’t burdening the planet with more emissions. They could easily see this transition as too costly or an attack on freedom and personal choice and be generally distrustful of institutions and change. Or they could see this transition as pragmatic and security-centric and one that’s smartly planning for future scenarios.

Research released recently, a first of its kind in Europe to measure perceptions of a just transition within the built environment, illustrates what is resonating with the public presently. The research polled over 20,000 people across 10 European countries: Czechia, France, Germany, Italy, UK, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Spain, and Sweden. And they tested three narratives, specifically — pragmatic, futurist and insecurity — to see what landed with communities across Europe.

Take a look at the narratives and what landed with the public:

First, the pragmatic approach to the built environment is all about conserving the best and fixing up the rest. It leads with the assumption that Europe already has the technologies needed to fix the problem. And if governments do this right, there will be positive co-benefits, like better air and better communities, etc. In short, the pragmatic approach ultimately knows what’s needed in the built environment, now it’s just finding the political will to make it happen.

Second, the futurist approach leans into the latest technologies, artificial intelligence and Europe’s engineering and industrial know-how to solve the buildings’ carbon footprint problem. They see this as a moonshot moment, using smart technology to achieve this generation’s moon landing but with buildings.

Third, the insecurity approach recognizes that the government promise of safe, affordable and secure housing is broken. This narrative highlights the housing affordability crisis and calls for a fair deal for everyone, including the poorest of the poor who’ve been impacted the most. It also demands a taking back of control of Europe’s buildings.

Now, how did 20,000 people from 10 European countries respond to these narratives?

What initially resonated most was the pragmatic narrative: 73% of respondents agreed with this narrative, compared to 63% agreeing with futurist narratives and 65% with insecurity narratives. This doesn’t come as a huge surprise since Europeans often see themselves as principled pragmatists in policy circles and European pragmatism is often written about in the literature. This identity is pervasive and prevalent in published media, thus it makes sense that this research would reflect that.

After engaging with all three narratives, however, the one that influenced European audiences the most was the insecurity narrative. Though this too may seem unsurprising since it reflects the current crises, as issues of housing, health and economic insecurity are of paramount importance for many populations right now — and were at the fore in recent EU elections.

Taken together, these findings present an opportunity. Rather than treating these salient insecurities in separate and siloed fashion — which media is doing with the housing and climate crises — it’s time to lean into the nexus where it all intersects.

As just one example from the research, tenants under 40 years of age, and from across the political spectrum, were most impacted by the insecurity narrative. And with the housing affordability crisis in full swing across Europe this tenant response is understandable. Another example found that “conversations about health inequalities, including topics such as air pollution, were often the least mentioned in the media but the most engaged with” by the public.

It’s these insecurities, in other words, that need our attention. Taken together, these findings present an opportunity, then. Rather than treating these salient insecurities in separate and siloed fashion — which the research found media is doing with the housing and climate crises — it’s time to lean into the nexus where it all intersects. That’s what intersectional leadership is all about.

Ensuring that a just transition within the built environment helps improve real security — as well as the public’s perceptions of security — across housing, health, economic and climate realities is the big lift ahead.

Too often, building decarbonization is framed as a carbon or climate issue versus a people or pocketbook opportunity. And if this research tells us anything it’s that we need to change that approach.

It’s time to track with the issues and insecurities that people are wary of and worried about — in other words, real world problems. That’s how to get the public engaged and build a populist agenda that’s pro-climate.

Buildings aren’t just the world’s biggest emitter, they’re the home for everything people hold dear, professionally and personally. And that’s what we need to secure.

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Dr. Michael Shank
Dr. Michael Shank

Written by Dr. Michael Shank

Professor, Planner, Philanthropist

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