8th Workshop CIB W108 - Climate Change and the Built Environment

Since the first meeting of CIB W 108 (climate change and the built environment) in Manchester in 2002, the interest for the issues on adaptation to climate change impacts has been growing in several countries. This question is now addressed at the European level. When it became more and more likely there was a link between green house gazes (GHG) emissions and potential climate change, the response of our societies was to ―turn off‖ the GHG tap. Two main emitters were identified: transport and the built environment. Mitigation policies were rather quickly decided. More demanding energy regulations for both new and existing buildings were elaborated and are being implemented since the beginning of the century. The expected benefits of these policies on climate change mitigation are nevertheless long term and rely on a generalisation of the prescribed measures in all countries at a comparable rate in order not to dilute the efforts of the most efficient countries. The most recent IPPC reports as well as recent observations confirm that climate change could occur faster than expected. Irrespective of the success of mitigation efforts, there will still be some degree of unavoidable climate change. As the built environment aims at protecting human populations and goods from climatic hazards, the perspective of mid term modifications of climatic hazards has then to be considered. This is the aim of adaptation policies: anticipate now the potential (positive or negative) impacts on the built environment due to a modified climate. The problem is complex as it concerns local long term decision making in a very uncertain global environment. Moreover, such a reflexion cannot, and must not, be disconnected from on-going reflexions and actions on sustainable construction. The convergence is quite obvious as both climate change issues and sustainability aim at limiting the burden on environment. CIB W 108 intends to contribute to the elaboration of these adaptation policies to be developed as far as the built environment is concerned. This expert group will in particular contribute to produce knowledge on technical aspects as well as on socio-economic aspects, including costs and benefits of different adaptation options and information on good practices.