We hope you've had a good October! It was a busy and successful month for MECLA, and November is looking like it won't be any different. Please see some of our key highlights of today's newsletter include:
MECLA attends the IGCC 2025 Summit and receives feedback on draft guidance for how investors can drive embodied carbon reductions
MECLA supports University of Southern Queensland and a potential Circular Materials CRC
MECLA Spotlight on Deviation from Material Specifications 13 November 3:30-5pm AEDT
Material specifications owned and managed by organisations require lengthy and costly deviation processes for new materials that don't meet their restrictive and/or prescriptive requirements, preventing the uptake of low embodied carbon (LEC) materials. This MECLA group’s mission was to develop case studies where LEC materials were implemented, outline how the ‘deviation’ process was involved, and how industry can learn from this to accelerate the uptake of LEC materials. The MECLA group identified interesting challenges and obstacles for both clients and the supply side which is worth tuning into.
The group will present three case studies and discuss their findings on the deviation processes, challenges and learnings in this 90-minute, online session.
Speakers include:
Yanni Papadopoulos, Capital Asset Advisor at Jones Lang LaSalle
Dan Leong Scott, Principal Civil Engineer at Sydney Water
Mark Trethewy, Sustainability Manager at John Holland Group
Jonathan Chew, Technical Leader - Clients & Markets, Laing O'Rourke
CJ Wilson, ANZ Sustainability Strategist, Robert Bird Group
Strategies, challenges, and opportunities in reducing the embodied carbon of MEP, structural and IT infrastructure components in data centres
The influence of different data centre typologies on embodied carbon considerations
The relationship between embodied carbon, water and energy efficiency in data centre development
Measuring embodied carbon in data centres
Scope 3 accountability and data centre development
Please register if you want to attend this event in Melbourne. If you can't make it in person, but this is an area of significant interest to you, please contact us below for other ways to engage around this topic.
On Wednesday, 29 October creators of the new Nature Design guide sat down with MECLA Project Director Monica Richter to discuss the newly launched resource.
The Nature Design Guide is a practical, industry-led framework for embedding nature-positive design into projects across Australia’s built environment. Nature-based design and embodied carbon reduction go hand in hand — because reducing embodied carbon forces people to think about upfront design and the kinds of materials that are used, all of which come from nature. Building with nature means building smarter, lighter, buildings and precincts, and thinking about connection to place, bringing bird song and plant species to where we live and work, creating a thriving and climate resilient ecosystem with lasting impact.
Watch our briefing on the new guide on our website now.
MECLA attends the Investors' Group on Climate Change 2025 Summit
On 16 and 17 October, the MECLA secretariat attended the IGCC 2025 Summit. MECLA Chair Hudson Worsley joined a panel discussion on green iron and steel opportunities for Australia, and the role of collaboration in unlocking the future market potential.
The event was also an opportunity for MECLA to introduce its draft Investors' Guide to Embodied Carbon to investors. Increasingly, real asset investors are considering their role in driving embodied carbon reductions, and how embodied carbon is reflected in their Scope 3 financed emissions. MECLA intends to provide guidance to financiers to enable them to drive outcomes in this space in both debt and equity arrangements. The work is receiving significant interest and has already been featured in The Urban Developer.
Following the IGCC Summit, the draft guidance was presented to the IGCC Subgroup on Real Assets for feedback. If you would like to be involved in the development of the guidance, and/or would like to see the draft guidance, please reach out!
The Australian built environment sector generates 29 megatonnes of waste annually—39% of the nation’s total—and is the fastest-growing waste-producing industry (National Waste Report 2024). While the construction and demolition (C&D) sector is already contributing to material recovery through reuse in roadbase and aggregates, more work is needed to ensure quality standards, design for end-of-life (EOL), and develop solutions for regional and small-scale projects. If you are an innovator and a materials manufacturer then this might be for you.
The Circular Materials CRC is a new 10-year initiative focused on creating cost-effective circular solutions across manufacturing, the built environment, and mining—three priority sectors identified in the National Circular Economy Framework. This cross-sector approach aims to improve material flows and strengthen business cases for circularity.
The CRC will drive progress through four key research programs: increasing material circularity and productivity, scaling research into commercial applications, informing regulation and legislation, and shifting behaviours to enable a circular economy.
An 11th working group has been convened by MECLA on Designing out Carbon. The group will look at different ways carbon can be saved through design for various aspects of an asset.
The work to create the guidance will be executed under a series of subgroups to the working group, each dedicated to a specific area of focus. The current key areas of focus are 'general', 'facade', 'structure', and 'interiors'.
If you want to learn more about the different working groups that make up MECLA, including this one, join an upcoming onboarding meeting!
You can find out more about MECLA by going to our website, by signing up to our newsletter or following us on LinkedIn to stay updated on future events and developments.
As always, email us with any questions and enquiries at info@mecla.org.au.
MECLA is funded through a mixture of industry and government commitments. We would like to thank all industry, research and government organisations that have already made a contribution to support MECLA going national.
MECLA c/o Climate-KIC Australia, University of Technology Sydney, Building 10, Level 10, Ultimo, NSW 2007, Australia
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