It’s difficult to open a media article, newsletter, blog, or conference agenda today without seeing some form of the words “net zero” or “decarbonization.” Climate change — regardless of one’s view of its severity — is one of the seminal and defining topics of our age. In the real estate sector, the relevance and imperative are even more heightened. Widely, our sector understands it is responsible for between 40 percent and 50 percent of global carbon dioxide emissions (per the Global Alliance for Building and Construction/Architecture 2030), a figure made even more staggering when we add in the potential resulting impacts of climate change on cities by 2050 (as detailed by the Urban Climate Change Research Network):

1.6 billion people living in more than 970 cities regularly exposed to high temperatures 800 million people vulnerable to coastal flooding 650 million people, in more than 500 cities, at risk of water shortages 2.5