Think Brick Sustainability Blog

On the 10 June 2009 the Australian Building Codes Board released its draft provisions for the 2010 BCA. They do this every year and apart from a few people in the construction industry, it rarely gets noticed or causes any great debate.

Not this year, however! The draft BCA 2010 guidelines include in them the first major move to improve the energy efficiency buildings in a number of years and reflect the recent COAG decision to implement a minimum 6 Star energy rating for residential buildings across Australia.

Putting aside for a moment the new provisions, an interesting and incredibly progressive position has been established in the Code on behalf of the Government. Whereas all previous editions of the Code (since 2003) have said that the objective of minimum energy performance standards was “to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by efficiently using energy”, BCA 2010 just says “to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.” In, and of itself, this doesn’t say much, but when combined with a comment from Ivan Donaldson, the head of the Australian Building Codes Board at a stakeholder forum on the new energy efficiency provisions at the end of May, this small change is huge.

After a question from the Residential Development Council about the costs of increasing the provisions, Ivan responded referring to the community costs of greenhouse gas emissions and that a larger perspective has to be taken: that of the community, not just the individual.

Whether or not Ivan intended to be so specific I’m not sure (I haven’t directly quoted him here, just conveyed my interpretation of his comments), but either way, it is a very progressive position and ultimately the only level at which we can debate all climate change policies.