A playbook for the real estate sector’s green transition
EPRA has partnered with JLL to launch a comprehensive guide that outlines key global and European carbon-related initiatives. By Lourdes Calderón Ruiz.
The role of the real estate sector in the green transition and building climate resilience is more critical than ever. The sector is at an important turning point, with a major part to play in addressing climate change. Given that buildings account for a significant portion of global greenhouse gas emissions, making this sector more sustainable is essential.
It is important to understand that this transition involves not just mitigating the impacts of climate change, but also building resilience against its inevitable effects.
In the real estate sector, this means transforming how buildings are designed, constructed and managed to reduce carbon emissions, promote resource efficiency and support sustainable development.
Climate resilience in this context refers to the capacity of properties, buildings and developments to anticipate, adapt, respond to and recover from the impacts of climate change.
By integrating climate resilience into their green transition plans, real estate companies can enhance both sustainability and resilience, reducing long-term costs associated with climate damage while protecting property values and ensuring buildings remain habitable.
Multiple factors are driving the green transition, such as increased awareness of climate risks, more stringent regulatory frameworks, investor demand for sustainable assets and rising tenant expectations, which are creating a robust incentive for the sector to shift to more sustainable practices.
Governments and organisations worldwide are implementing mandatory and voluntary environmental, social and governance (ESG) disclosure rules, placing real estate companies under increasing pressure to reduce their carbon footprints while enhancing their resilience to climate impacts.
In the middle of this jungle, the decarbonisation of the built environment becomes a key element of the desirable transition.
However, the overwhelming number of carbon-related initiatives makes it very difficult for real estate companies to choose one and achieve their desired goal.
The Carbon Transition Playbook
To address this, the European Public Real Estate Association (EPRA), recognising its significant responsibility in building climate resilience, partnered with JLL to launch The Carbon Transition Playbook. It is a comprehensive guide that outlines key global and European carbon-related initiatives, both mandatory and voluntary, that affect the real estate sector.
This playbook serves to inform real estate companies about various available initiatives, detailing their specific goals, requirements, challenges and opportunities.
Additionally, it shares case studies of EPRA members that have already embarked on their sustainability journeys, to offer insights and encouragement for new adopters.
‘Aligning existing initiatives, rather than creating new ones, will streamline efforts and maximise resources. The industry must advocate for standardised methodologies.’
Lourdes Calderón Ruiz, EPRA
The different carbon-related initiatives that have emerged to help the real estate sector align with broader climate goals have been identified applying a robust methodology and have been categorised in The Carbon Transition Playbook into commitments, frameworks, guidelines, labels, regulations and standards.
The intention is to help, inspire and drive collective progress towards our common goal of net-zero carbon emissions and guide our members.
For example, voluntary pledges like net-zero carbon targets encourage companies to reduce emissions progressively, while frameworks such as the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) and the Science-Based Targets initiative (SBTi) offer structured approaches to measuring and managing carbon emissions.
The report highlights the crucial role of initiatives focusing on expanding carbon scopes to include both operational and embodied emissions. While progress is evident, some of the key challenges include inconsistent measurement methodologies, data availability and the high upfront costs of implementing sustainability measures.
The Carbon Transition Playbook stresses the importance of energy efficiency as a priority in reducing emissions and advocates for a holistic approach to decarbonisation across entire property portfolios. Greater collaboration among stakeholders is essential.
Aligning existing initiatives, rather than creating new ones, will streamline efforts and maximise resources.
The industry must continue advocating for standardised methodologies, reliable funding and transparent reporting to drive impactful change.
Multi-faceted approach
To sum up, we want to emphasise that, as the real estate sector navigates the complexities of the green transition, it is clear that a multi-faceted approach is required. This approach should involve not only adhering to regulatory requirements, but also embracing voluntary commitments and striving for continuous improvement in sustainability practices.
Lourdes Calderón Ruiz is ESG manager at EPRA
