Jess Hrivnak: 0:00

So at the RIBA, I am the practice team's technical advisor. If we think about the difference in where we are now to 2011, we cannot afford to ignore climate change. Shouldn't have architecture that really caught my eye and that was the marrying of science and art. As a teenager, I set up a green group at school. I was really passionate about that. That was back in the day, pre-computers. We were all share, wanting to make the world a better place. Too much automation seems to backfire because you can't please everybody all of the time. I don't think any of us use our buildings the way they were designed. We are bound to the biosphere, what the planet can carry, the mental health aspect of this climate change.

Darren Evans: 0:49

Hi and welcome to today's episode on the Thriving Construction podcast with me, darren Evans. Today, our guest is Jess Rivnak from RIBA. Jess, so good to have you here.

Jess Hrivnak: 1:02

Thank you so much, Darren.

Darren Evans: 1:03

Can you just give us a little bit of a rundown of who you are, your background very briefly, but I guess kind of more importantly what it is that you do currently?

Jess Hrivnak: 1:12

Yeah, thank you. So at the RIBA, I am the practice team's technical advisor on sustainability, so my work spans a lot of the teams working and supporting my colleagues If they've got questions on sustainability but, very importantly, supporting our members in terms of creating writing and sustainability guidance and working on cross-industry initiatives, which I'm sure we're going to come on to and talk a little bit more, the big one being the UKNet Zero Carbon Building Standard. So my background is architecture, unsurprisingly.

Darren Evans: 1:51

You're a qualified architect.

Jess Hrivnak: 1:52

No, so I stopped pre-part three.

Darren Evans: 1:55

So I did my part my diploma.

Jess Hrivnak: 1:58

But before the diploma I did an M-Phil in environmental design and that was very much my passion and so quite quickly, after sort of working in practice, I kind of wanted to pursue that angle more.

Jess Hrivnak: 2:12

So then I sort of worked in sustainability consultancy for the past I don't know how many, probably 16, going on 17 years, quite a long time and with that hat on in the sustainability consultants' day in the world, I was working with Bill Gething on the first ROBA green overlay to the plan of work. So that's going back to 2011. And I always think about that as a really kind of good news story in the construction industry, because if we think about the difference in where we are now to 2011, where we were talking about an overlay, sustainability being an optional extra that you might want to consider, and actually now in the 2020 ROBA plan of work, it's embedded and you have to do and have to think about sustainability and have to have a sustainability strategy. So you know progress and it's sort of evident and it's really been wonderful to be part of that journey, do you?

Darren Evans: 3:12

think that's a big progress, or would you say that that progress is quite small in your opinion?

Jess Hrivnak: 3:18

I think it's quite big progress because I think it's really an example where something has become a norm and when it's embedded into the normal way of doing things. It would be strange now, on any project, not to mention sustainability. And probably from a business perspective, you wouldn't have that kind of long-term viability if you didn't consider the future from a business perspective and that is really ingrained with what kind of future is that for the business? But obviously then we're talking about building assets and the climate itself is going to be so different in that future. So we have to think about that now. So I do think it is a big, significant jump.

Jess Hrivnak: 4:10

And then so I was then as a sustainability consultant, then working with the ROBA in a sort of honorary capacity as part of the Sustainable Futures Group when Gary Clark was chairing it. So that was an advisory group and that's where the group under Gary was sort of created the 2030 Climate Challenge. So it's been really amazing now working as staff, being involved and looking after that challenge and the version two and the update. So seeing that trajectory is really positive.

Darren Evans: 4:43

What would you say has been the catalyst to that change, then, from 2011, when you first started, through to now?

Jess Hrivnak: 4:48

Well, I think there is a number of things, there have been a number of influences and I think we look at the Stern report was a big thing.

Darren Evans: 4:59

Talk about the Stern report actually, just really briefly just for the people that don't know.

Jess Hrivnak: 5:03

So that was 2016,. I believe a Stern report which, for the first time, really hit the headlines and really hit the newspapers. A media picked up on this and it was really saying that we cannot afford to ignore climate change, because the cost and I think the big difference was in that report. It was putting the cost of the environmental damage that would occur if we carried on in the same trajectory, and I think it was that very high profile document equating it in monetary terms, and I think that was quite a big change. So I think that then Al Gore's film was also quite a big one, which was a different media, but that was again made it really more part of the common conversation. And then, closer to our current time, was the 2018 special report, which highlighted the difference between 1.5 and 1.8 and two degrees warming. So I think all of those were really high profile influences and then the sort of media becoming more and more powerful.

Jess Hrivnak: 6:28

And then I think we need to also pay Greta a tribute because, she has made a difference in terms of getting that media attention and bringing that onto the stage in a kind of very different, a new way. What did that happen?

Darren Evans: 6:48

When was it that Greta Thunberg? She stayed outside and refused to go to school, didn't she initially? Yeah, in Sweden and then got attention from the media in that way. Do you remember when that was?

Jess Hrivnak: 6:59

So I think she started 2017, 2018. I don't know. We need to fact check that.

Darren Evans: 7:09

I'm just wondering. Just sat here wondering yes, I know that influence comes in lots of different shapes and sizes in lots of different areas, but just wondering where that showed up. One of the things that's in my mind that showed up I think it's really notable is the COVID pandemic, that it seemed, at least from my business, that the conversations that we were having changed quite significantly towards the end of 2021, maybe the end of 2020, but definitely towards the end of 2021, towards the end of the pandemic, and it felt as though people would actually had the opportunity to sit and to observe nature, to sit and to think about, actually, what am I doing with my life, as in, what's my relationship like with my nearest and dearest, what's my relationship like with work, what's my relationship like with myself and also what's my relationship like with the environment around me.

Jess Hrivnak: 8:04

Yeah, I think the nature of the sort of conversation around sustainability changed. Well-being came much more to the fore. But I think architects declare, construction declares, engineers declare that you know that tidal wave was already happening and that's been very, very strong. And I think the COVID pandemic on one hand has had some negative you know, pull back on the progress that we were making but also it's had some positives in terms of that, as you say, that connection, that personal connection and people becoming more aware of well-being and that they enjoy nature. And I think that personal experience is really, really fundamental because you know, otherwise these numbers, this message, just becomes so ephemeral. It happens somewhere else, to somebody else, but when we experience it, then it's you know different it becomes real.

Darren Evans: 9:15

So let's go back, you know Jess, back to early, early Jess, young Jess. What would you say were events that happened in your early years that have pointed you towards either architecture or a care for sustainability, or a sense of I want to do something that has meaning in the world.

Jess Hrivnak: 9:37

Architecture was very much because I remember right through A-levels being really interested in humanities and science and not really wanting to sort of take a direction. That kind of restricted me. So I had quite a motley bag of topics and trying to kind of look through what kind of courses I might want to study and I should hasten to have. There is literally nobody who has any design, any architecture, any graphics in my family, on either side, and it was a description of architecture that really caught my eye and that was the marrying of science and art and there was also something about creating environments in the course description and I just read that and I thought that's for me, that's what I want to do, and that kind of opened my eyes in terms of that's a really interesting subject and a really, you know, profound profession in a way, because it touches on so many different things and how important it is to everybody because we all inhabit space.

Darren Evans: 11:06

We all need buildings, don't we, for sure? I'm wondering do you class yourself as an artist?

Jess Hrivnak: 11:11

As an artist. I'm not sure I would classify myself as an artist, no Do you like art though. I do like art.

Darren Evans: 11:18

And creation.

Jess Hrivnak: 11:18

You like creation? I really do like creation.

Darren Evans: 11:21

So, as a little girl, then what things would you construct or make or design?

Jess Hrivnak: 11:27

Oh, yeah, well, I'd make cities Absolutely. Yeah, From what?

Darren Evans: 11:31

Lego.

Jess Hrivnak: 11:32

Yeah, blocks, wooden blocks. I had huge areas of my room covered in wooden blocks.

Darren Evans: 11:39

And really really. No, no, it was cities. And you were, how old.

Jess Hrivnak: 11:43

Six, seven, eight, yeah, and then they got populated as well.

Jess Hrivnak: 11:49

So, I would. People too. They would all get drawn, they had stories and they got cut out. Yeah, I then, because I used to have a futon, because that's quite a small flat, so it would get rolled up so I could have more space to play, and I remember all these creations. I didn't want to ever knock them down. So then I would like turn around and sleep on the outside of the city, you know, to be able to carry on the next day. Yeah, and I just, I see, yeah that. So maybe that was the start.

Darren Evans: 12:20

Would you give the people that lived in these cities that you created? Would you give them stories and characters and interact with each other?

Jess Hrivnak: 12:26

Yeah, yeah, yeah, but yeah, it was always. It was always cities rather than a house.

Darren Evans: 12:34

And transportation. How did that work?

Jess Hrivnak: 12:36

That did not feature. Yeah, everyone walks, Okay awesome.

Darren Evans: 12:41

What did your parents think of this?

Jess Hrivnak: 12:43

Oh yeah they're.

Darren Evans: 12:44

Was it your bedroom?

Jess Hrivnak: 12:46

Yeah, it was just the bedroom. It was just the bedroom. Yeah, it was just the bedroom.

Darren Evans: 12:51

Yeah, it was fun. So that's fascinating. And how six-year-old Jess then is, you know this is the beginnings of the thing that you're doing now is being involved in a real sense of cities and living and how people like now. I love that. Maybe, Six-year-old Jess, think of you right now, what you're doing.

Jess Hrivnak: 13:16

Probably quite a lot of incomprehension. To be honest, I'm not creating anything with my hands, so I think that's it's quite a it's too big a jump for a six-year-old to understand. But I think a lot of the ideas and I think a lot of the objectives and ambition which I'm quite well with have always been interested in and what I care about. Really that's good.

Darren Evans: 13:48

And so then, when you got to the place of kind of teenage years, where would you say that you were influenced then to go down the architectural room the first big driver was environmental and you know I set up as a teenager as a teenager I set up a green group at school.

Jess Hrivnak: 14:10

I was really passionate about that. That was back in the day, pre computers. So I typed out a newsletter was about green things on a typewriter, cut it out, pasted it together for to, copied it. That got sold around the school bit of an entrepreneurial spirit going on and then tried to set up a Group of linking Other schools that had green groups which was what we called ourselves back in the day between other schools to Join together cells, really keen to try and get that going, because it was very difficult and I think I see that Today social media has really enabled that on the one hand, but I still think it.

Jess Hrivnak: 15:02

There are some. Some things that happen, you know, are the same. That was very difficult as a teenager to have agency and to have the opportunity. So I distinctly remember trying to organize a tree planting event. On paper a teenager can dig a hole with a spade, it's not that difficult. But because you are under 18. It was just literally impossible and I'm unless you had somebody else organizing it for you or some structured way of doing it, it seemed impossible to kind of Get this thing off the ground. So then eventually just sort of doing this by joining in something else that was already happening, but it was that on many fronts, that was really difficult, and so that's why I was trying, by bringing people together, other green groups and other schools is to try and share ideas and to Workouts collaboratively what lands and how do you bring about change in your schools? Because they seem to be, at the time, the bunch of kids telling us what to do.

Jess Hrivnak: 16:25

I don't know, yeah, but lots of kids come up with the same ideas or same strategies. Maybe something change, changes. So I think that was kind of more the drive for me and it didn't get very far because we had a distinct lack of infrastructure as in no computers, no internet Really quite difficult. But I did meet some really good people through that and also it taught me quite a lot about how we collaborate and how we organize. Things is really important, like the journey is really part of the learning rather than the end.

Jess Hrivnak: 17:17

Obviously important. But how you get this? I think that was the kind of impetus, and then architecture was marrying that science and art together and it's kind of combines all these three things seems like.

Darren Evans: 17:33

from quite a young age you've always had a picture in your head of what I did, good looks like or what you would like to do, and it's a case of you finding your group or your people reaching out to other groups and other people to try and help that become a reality.

Jess Hrivnak: 17:49

Yeah, that's fair, and I think none of us can do anything really by ourselves together we can.

Darren Evans: 17:58

Would you say that's the kind of the sense that the RIBA are all about as well is is is aligning with those thoughts that you have of a future in a certain way, and trying to gather other people together to help me.

Jess Hrivnak: 18:12

I think the RIBA is in this amazing position with All its men, the membership and all its members and having that power of the members and that kind of reach which is global, and also the recognition of RIBA as a long standing Institute. So it has real clout in terms of my colleagues when they're lobbying, but also when we get asked to speak, there is always going to be a member who happens to have amazing expert expertise in that thing. Being able to kind of marry the person to the event is what a lot of success should look like.

Darren Evans: 19:05

I think you mentioned that the RIBA is a global organization.

Jess Hrivnak: 19:12

Maybe I should ask what countries it's not in, as opposed to what country it is in I wouldn't know the statistics of of where we don't have members, but I think the rough splitters a 80% UK, 20% overseas, I think. So yes, it is predominantly UK, but you know, lots of members have projects overseas as well. So there is that kind of global.

Darren Evans: 19:37

Reach and what's your? What's your specialty? You mentioned what you do for the organization, but I'm just wondering what your specialty is and the thing that you're really passionate about, if you just to pick one sustainability Very broad is there an element within sustainability? Then maybe, if I can be so cheekiest to ask you to narrow a little bit.

Jess Hrivnak: 20:02

Don't know. I think, like many architects, was sort of a jack of all trades master and I wouldn't really like to say I'm an invisible.

Darren Evans: 20:11

I'm not really not for me personally.

Jess Hrivnak: 20:16

You know a little bit about a lot, not necessarily one super deep Area is there an element though that within sustainability.

Darren Evans: 20:27

So if I did so, the reason I'm asking is I think, if you take the word sustainability, it can mean lots of different things to lots of different people, and and for some people it may even feel like an overused word with no meaning. And so I'm wondering, within that word sustainability, where the meaning is for you in the it is difficult question.

Jess Hrivnak: 20:51

I think we talk a lot about jargon and we talk a lot about greenwashing, but I think where everybody agrees and certainly I agree Is that we will share wanting to make the world a better place and so recognizing that that better Comes with social impacts, environmental impacts and economic impacts.

Jess Hrivnak: 21:23

And our conversations are Very much of the built environment and the role the built environment has, a how, how to do that in our it, because that's where Our members have agency, because that's our profession. And the most pressing aspect of all of that the moment is carbon emissions. And I kind of think of that as the door, the gateway to those other things, because Biodiversity is impacted from climate change and economically, many parts of the country already feeling the impacts of climate change. And socially, people are in many parts of the world feeling the impacts of climate change and therefore Carbon emissions are really critical. As you as that kind of gateway, if we're going to do one thing, let's tackle that, because then that's that ripple on effect. Yes, obviously there are lots of biodiversity impacts and everything but, but if we have to triage somehow, because we do, Everything can be a priority at the same time, exactly.

Jess Hrivnak: 22:50

I think that that is the most pressing thing. So Tackling how, in our industry, we can practice our profession Not even my profession, how members profession in a way that limits Carbon emissions is really important and I think let's be bold that also will, in the coming years, mean we have to think about what it means to be an architect and can we use that creativity in New ways To create that better world.

Darren Evans: 23:32

What does that mean then? This pick up on that what that means. How could that? How could the definition of architect change then in the future? How could you see? So we're just playing here this is now this isn't the RIBA version of, so no one needs to panic, but I just this is the six year old girl playing on your bedroom floor here. Kind of this is imagination stuff.

Jess Hrivnak: 23:51

My very personal opinion is architecture of the capital A has to die and we need to be much more collaborative and much more humble in our approach and to the environment and the built environment. And we need to see the future and the beauty and complexity. And that means those retrofit projects, those really difficult, difficult assets that we have at the moment and how do we upgrade those? How do we make use of the things that make and mend attitude and how do we do that in the built environment and not Always feel we need the shiny new, the new design, that everything has got stamped with a big ego on it.

Darren Evans: 24:41

Is that what architecture is? With the capital A, then everything's shiny new, everything's look. This is my creation and everything on it is just been dug up from somewhere or created in the factory somewhere. Is that what that means?

Jess Hrivnak: 24:55

Yeah, I think, I mean, yeah, I think that desire to create something and have my design and that drives quite a few students. I would say but actually, can we, can that create that really amazing ability to synthesize complex Issues, different disciplines that's what architecture really goes out. And thinking about solutions and thinking about space and how that space could be used and how that space is read by different people, and how can we do that to inhabit and make those existing buildings and those places new? And so it's that kind of dreaming big. How can we reinvent the existing and the dying cities as well?

Darren Evans: 25:55

And you mentioned about materials as well. That's interesting that you bought that up. I've spoken with people fairly recently talking about the reuse of materials and how there isn't a structure at the moment enables an architect to go in, know what materials are available for reuse In six months time or a year's time or 18 months time, and how just having that facility or having that business or community or whatever might look like that would be a game changer for architects. Do you think the same in that?

Jess Hrivnak: 26:31

in that way, yeah, I think lots and lots of people talk about Material passports and digital twins and I think All this the software, the tech is amazing and it will be a game changer, but it still boils down to human management because somebody has got to manage that process and make sure that that is going to be handed down and that exists, those files are maintained and that information will be available in 60, 70, 80 years time. But, yeah, thinking about the onward life is really important and I mean we just have to change our whole mindset to how we use stuff, from this very, very linear approach to stuff to a much more.

Darren Evans: 27:36

I want, I no longer want or I need, I no longer need.

Jess Hrivnak: 27:40

Yes, and why is it? I mean a really mundane example. I broke the fitting on the Mock bucket at home, which sits inside. You know the Mock bucket. Can I buy my local hardware store the insert to the bucket? No, I have to go and buy an entire bucket. It doesn't make sense. That's a whole bunch of plastic and that's just a teeny, tiny example. But we're doing this at every scale and Duncan Baker Brown was just talking yesterday at a conference about his waste house and the fact that he's got 20,000 single use toothpaste toothbrushes that are in being used in the walls of this waste house that they built at Brighton University and those toothbrushes have been used once by the business and first class passengers on flights into Gatwick. So there we are, digging out fossil fuels, creating these plastic toothbrushes. They're then flown to New York and then used once as people fly back to the UK and then chucked.

Darren Evans: 29:01

And it's just madness Once you get 20,000 of these things together and when you think about it that way, you're like, wow, that's a big deal. But I feel fairly confident that no one flying in first class with a toothbrush.

Darren Evans: 29:18

I've never done it would think, oh, this is a waste. I'm going to put this in my pocket and keep using it until it's come to the end of life. I don't need it anymore. I did need it. Now I don't need it, but I did something revolutionary the other day. How old is my vacuum? I think my vacuum must be at least eight years old seven eight years old.

Darren Evans: 29:43

We were on the verge of throwing it away because it just wasn't performing, but we took it to a repair shop and it just needed a service. It's kind of what you're talking about, isn't?

Jess Hrivnak: 29:53

it. There's also fantastic sort of nationwide chain, but they're all volunteer led library of things which I'm massively passionate about and remember of, and it's as library of books. This is a library of things, so for all the gadgets that you maybe use once but you don't need a power tool sitting in your home all the time you can go and borrow it for minimal five pounds for two weeks or whatever, and then you do your DIY project and you give it back and somebody else can use it. And that extends to party disco lights, to everything you know, anything and everything, things, stuff that you might not need ever again.

Darren Evans: 30:44

Just not toothbrush though. No not that. Yeah, that's a really, really good idea, and so how does that work? Do you drive to someone's house or it's a local community? It's a local hub, yeah, and does that cover all of London or is it outside of London?

Jess Hrivnak: 31:01

I think there are community libraries of things in London. I use my local one in the Southwest and, yeah, go and pick it up, return it. Fantastic idea and it's great. And all staff by volunteers and they also then teach share and repair sessions. So they teach people. If you've got a vacuum cleaner that's broken down, you can bring it in and they have a bunch of volunteers who will are experts in electrical stuff and will show you if it is repairable. So with the idea that you then learn and next time you can do it yourself.

Jess Hrivnak: 31:39

So yeah, those are kind of some grassroots things that are changing the way.

Darren Evans: 31:46

But you know, kind of back onto, back onto architecture, you know that's connected, though it is connected Part of this, this way that we live and interact together, and I think that these types of things also have an impact on the type of buildings that are being built. So if we spend more time, I think, repairing things and having less stuff than the buildings that are used, maybe for distribution or warehouses or manufacturers, the purpose of those buildings then start to change.

Jess Hrivnak: 32:18

Yeah, but it's also about how we use our buildings, because there is such potential to these, these hubs, they're so popular and when we're designing whether it's community buildings is designing enough space to facilitate this kind of activity, because it's such an asset and also means that storage is particularly when you've got on a flat storage is quite high premium, but you don't need to have everything because you can borrow it. And do we need to own anything? And I guess that is like now, post pandemic you brought the pandemic up earlier, dude does every business need an office? We're seeing that move away from people kind of going hot desking as well. So that shift in. Do I need to own physical stuff to do? I need to own a desk is kind of similar, I guess.

Darren Evans: 33:28

So, just looking at some things that we have discussed in the past, you said here that there's intimate interplay between design work and behavioral impact. I think that we've covered this a little bit. Is that how do you influence someone's behavior so that the design can be different? Or do you design something different so someone's behavior changes? So there's an interplay between two. In order for us to work towards a more sustainable built environment, I think the two need to work either in heart. They definitely need to work in harmony, but it's a little bit for me like which is first the chicken or the egg.

Darren Evans: 34:19

Do you design something and then look for the behavior, or do you change the behavior and then have that influence the design? So let me give you a practical example. So we do lots of SAP calculations, we do S BAM calculations and we also do passive house. So passive house in one area of the market does really really well because someone wants the passive house if it's in the private market, they understand what it is, they've done their research and they're like I'm focused on what this passive house because of and you can fill in the blank for the reason.

Darren Evans: 34:53

So different scenario would be maybe someone that has got a passive house built for them and they've moved into that house because they're renting that passive house. They don't really understand what it is. They've got some operation manual that someone's given to them. They're not really bought into the idea and so they don't use the house in the way that it's designed to use. Not because the house is the problem, but because their behavior isn't in line with with the house is just kind of wondering what your thoughts are on that.

Jess Hrivnak: 35:25

Yeah, I think I mean you're talking quite a lot about nudge theory is whether we kind of nudge people, and traffic calming is a really good example of that, particularly when you've got traffic island in the middle, and you'll have your know firsthand, because we experience it, that we're often when we go across into the middle of the traffic island and there, when there's lights and we have railings, we often have to walk and then we turn slightly right and then we talk to turn slightly left before we go over the next set of traffic lights, but it's not out of the blue is because we are being made to turn our bodies to face the oncoming traffic so that we just run straight out and get killed. So there are ways that we can influence how people use a space, for sure, but then do we. Is that the right thing to do? Question mark, you know, because do we want to have stuff done to us or do we want to have control?

Jess Hrivnak: 36:38

About his agency agency and I think you know all really successful project or buildings that people you know people really like they. Like them because they have a sense of control. They can control their immediate environment. So Whether that's turning on the lights, opening the window, putting a plant on their desk, whatever it is, so that sense of being able to make have a say in the atmosphere. And I've done some sort of post occupancy evaluation On supposedly very, very sustainable buildings where it's all you know by BMS and it's all controlled. You know people are freezing and then they bring in their little portable and complain bitterly about drafts and what have you. But I don't think we, any of us, use our buildings. They the way they were designed. If you think back the lots of the building stock in the UK, I find it really fascinating when you speak to conservation architects you know there's Passionately talk about Gain off Our windows and the kind of the shutters and all of those things that we've Lost over over the years.

Darren Evans: 38:50

This country isn't it.

Jess Hrivnak: 38:52

But If you can find some of those old Victorian photographs, even central London we had allings, external awnings, fabric ones which now you wouldn't be able to put up, a sort of sale outside yeah exactly.

Jess Hrivnak: 39:15

So we're not using our buildings the way they were designed. So, yes, there is a bit of sort of things that we can improve on how we use our buildings, but also there is a bit of design to kind of make it like the smartphone. You know, if you give any kid now, or a knife patty, you know you give any kid, they automatically know what to do because it's intuitive and we need to do some of that intuitive product design into our buildings. It's great having zoned lighting, but if you have, then, an array of 12 different buttons, you know, and none of them are marked, and you have, you know you've got to go through all of them to work out which is the light switch that does the light that I want to have.

Darren Evans: 40:09

So it sounds, then, from what you're saying. Technology would be a great help in the buildings of the future. To try and help us to have that balance between automation and simplicity, as well as agency or freedom to choose.

Jess Hrivnak: 40:28

I think the right, the, I think, technology in the right places but there's, I think we can't hide the technology too much. I think I think simple, robust buildings work, and that kind of is demonstrated time and time again because they are flexible enough to allow change for use, but and they're robust enough and our RBA president of the past coined that very well long life loose fit, you know that works. So these very, very high-tech buildings, something always goes wrong, you know, and so there's that kind and people like like the simplicity of things. So I think it is a matter of using the technology where it matters and where it's needed best and not embedding it too much throughout the building, because that's the other problem. If we're talking, going back to your point about reusing materials, our love of creating these really, really complex composite materials means that we can't harvest them. So the the simpler they are, the more our buildings can become kind of material stores and be demounted and reconfigured if they have to be.

Darren Evans: 42:05

If they can't be reconfigured internally or repurposed internally, so, moving on question view, have you heard about bamboo being used in replacement for steel for reinforced concrete?

Jess Hrivnak: 42:17

no I haven't.

Darren Evans: 42:19

There was a article I was reading not too long ago that has said that there has been significant studies done on this and even down to the detail of protecting bamboo about absorbing too much water because there was a fear of that, and how. In the developed world this is very rarely known and that's why it's not being used. And actually bamboo could be used for not just the reinforcement of concrete but also for scaffold and a number of other elements that go within a building to ensure its structural integrity. But I didn't know that until the other day I accidentally happened upon that article. It's interesting that there are other things that are out in the natural world, maybe that have been used in the past and maybe commonly used in other cultures, have not quite made it onto the, the kind of the the Western world stage of construction you know the way we design our buildings.

Jess Hrivnak: 43:28

You know has to, has to shift, is and is gradually shifting. But for me it's less of a finding replacements but minimizing all resource, because we can't just advocate for a shift from ggbs, because that is going to be ggbs granulated ground blast slag so sorry, just for those people and for my benefit as well.

Darren Evans: 43:59

What does? What does ggbs do?

Jess Hrivnak: 44:01

it replaces some of the cement content.

Jess Hrivnak: 44:04

Concrete and cement has the highest okay and body carbon in your concrete, but that because everybody is going to be using it. We can talk about steel. If we use recycled steel, that means we remove the ability of other people to use recycled steel. So everything if we start building more in timber, that's a limited resource because our planet has got a carrying capacity and you know there's not physically enough land to plant. That meant you choose, so it's more about every single material the broader picture, as opposed to just focusing on one thing.

Jess Hrivnak: 44:52

Yeah, place that was something else yeah and I think it's you know using every sufficiency rather than efficiency reminds me of the story.

Darren Evans: 45:00

I don't think it's a true story, but the story goes when the UK colonized India, the UK government really concerned about the amount of King Cobras that existed and that were biting people, and so what the government said is they would give X amount of pounds or rupees to whoever bought a dead snake in. And so that's what they did, and local still. That's a really good idea.

Darren Evans: 45:31

I am now going to farm snakes, so they get the snakes and they farm them and they and they're and they're doing really, really well, and the British government are like, whoa what? We're getting loads of snakes. Until someone says, do you know that these snakes are actually being bred in captivity? And and a Justin, there was uproar, right, we're gonna stop this. And so they put a stop to it. And then all these snakes just just lost their value overnight and so they will let go into the wild. So that's the kind of the scenario that you're talking about, isn't? It is that you, you go along one path to try and solve a problem.

Jess Hrivnak: 46:10

Actually, you cause another problem by trying to solve that original problem yeah, I mean the unattended condit consequences of your actions, but I still argue that some action is better than no action, yeah, so we can't.

Jess Hrivnak: 46:30

We can't do nothing and also, with the best will in the world, paralysis is not a good state to be in.

Jess Hrivnak: 46:40

You can't, you're never going to have all the information, because you are only able to make a judgment on what is in front of you and your responsibility is to try and gather as much information as possible and then make the best choice that you can at that given time. But I think we all have to hold our hands up and sort of say well, yeah, quite likely I'm gonna make mistakes, but let's learn from those mistakes. And I think that kind of push and move, certainly to now start reporting on actual building performance data, is part of that real desire to kind of let's look at actually the performance of our buildings operational energy, embodied carbon and let's look really like critically but not maliciously, because I think we can critique with a per positive attitude, because we want to learn how to do the good things that we do already and do those better, rather than a kind of we're critiquing something to knock it down so do you then think that this relates directly to the 2030 climate change milestones?

Jess Hrivnak: 48:11

yes, so that's very much something that, when the first version of the 2030 RBA climate challenge was published in 2019, we knew the targets weren't perfect, but they were the best that we could make them at the time and it was better to publish them and change them and update them.

Jess Hrivnak: 48:36

And that's exactly what we did in 2021.

Jess Hrivnak: 48:39

And because we found that over those those two years, more data was coming from industry, particularly on embodied carbon, and we realized that the first lot of targets were probably more correlated to upfront carbon rather than embodied carbon right across all the embodied carbon modules. So that and then we all we worked very closely with Letty, the whole life carbon network, and I struck to look at the carbon alignment piece which is on the Letty's website. So we've got aligning targets and methodologies so that across the built environment, everyone is measuring the same things in the same way with the same scopes, and that you can start comparing apples with apples and like for like, so, and then that fed into the update of the 2030 climate challenge. So you're very much that kind of ambition is there. And then now with the built environment carbon database, which is another cross industry piece, becoming the single one repository for performance data and really trying to encourage everybody to submit their project data into that database so that it becomes freely accessible and a real tool for the whole industry.

Darren Evans: 50:10

What is that carbon database? And just just for those people that are listening, what so it's?

Jess Hrivnak: 50:15

a platform, an online platform, and you can submit your embodied carbon data or your operational data into that platform, and that data is then both at product level but also building level, available for others. And we used the built environment carbon database, as the sort of in its beta version, as the vehicle to submit data for the call for evidence for the UK90 carbon building standard and it's now sort of being launched officially, the carbon database.

Jess Hrivnak: 50:53

So you know the kind of future, my kind of vision of the future would be amazing whether all the, all the institutes that have supported this database and its creation, all of them have highly regarded awards programs and can those in the future have integrated sort of data collection and awards entry systems where there is already such a move from CIPC, from the ROPA, to incrementally keep ask awards entries you know those submissions to include actual performance data and can that just automatically be done through the built environment carbon database and enrich the database as well as submit projects for awards? There's also making people who are submitting data feel comfortable enough that their data is going to be anonymized, because that's currently one of the biggest sort of barriers are, interestingly, quite often from help domestic projects, because she's talking like housing authorities no talking about developers if they've got domestic private individuals to submit them energy data because they fear that if somebody could track when they're in the property and when they're not based on their kind of usage.

Jess Hrivnak: 52:27

And it's just quite interesting because there is that one, for everyone's got smart phones and they're quite happy sharing a lot of data, especially in the holiday, right yeah, instagram. On their location and where they are. So I think there are ways of kind of providing that certainty or that assurance that this isn't the ultimate game, isn't A to break into people's homes, b to penalize people either, but it is.

Darren Evans: 53:03

To cause you a problem, is it?

Jess Hrivnak: 53:04

No, it is to make the industry solve the problem and find out, because there is. If you look at the automobile industry, it's all about performance there, and that's really direct feedback, whereas the built environment is totally different, and I think we need more of that mentality.

Darren Evans: 53:28

And also with that is, the manufacturers of the automobiles are directly accountable to that performance and that feedback comes back from the customer. I don't see that in the construction industry is that the organization that is responsible for that product, be that residential or non-residential, is very difficult for the users of that building to know if it's underperformed. Should my property be performing in this way?

Darren Evans: 54:04

But, actually it's not. Or if my property is overperforming, I expect it to be here, but actually it's like way up here. Wow, let me tell someone, there isn't that element to it either.

Jess Hrivnak: 54:17

No, I mean there is energy performance contracting.

Jess Hrivnak: 54:20

It could be baked into the contract to say the client wants a Decay, so display energy certificate of an A when the building is two years after the building is handed over and that's then sort of baked into the contract and that in use performance is very much part of what you are providing, not just the building, so it's the whole package.

Jess Hrivnak: 54:48

But what's interesting and I think really clever in those situations is to really ring fence where the responsibilities lie, because obviously as a designer of any part of the consulting team on that project, you don't want to be responsible if the client then changes the opening hours and you know this shop or whatever your is then 24-7 operation whereas you've designed it for only 10 hours Because obviously that's going to have a massive impact on the energy performance. So really delineating what the brief was, what the assumptions are and what your design is based on and who's responsible for which elements and where does the contractor come on board and what elements are the client responsible for. So I think there are systems that do that and I think it's different in the individual kind of housing market, because there's not more complex.

Darren Evans: 56:03

So you've mentioned Letty a couple of times. How do you work with Letty and do they add value to what you do? Absolutely Do you add value to what they do.

Jess Hrivnak: 56:14

Letty has been so successful started off as the London Energy Transformation Initiative and now as the Low Energy Transformation Initiative, really recognising that it is swept the country, the nation by store.

Darren Evans: 56:30

Without any government backing funding no one asked them to come together, but yet their influence is significant.

Jess Hrivnak: 56:39

Yeah, clara deserves an amazing award and medal for what she created. And real power of Letty is that it's a very democratic bringing together of experts from across the built environment who care and who share that kind of passion to co-create guidance and climate emergency design guide, the retrofit design guide. We work together as the Institute. We talked about the carbon alignment, so aligning the targets and obviously working together on the UKNet Zero Carbon Building Standard. So lots and lots of our members at the RBI are generously donating their time to Letty, which is fantastic, but I would also say it's really valuable as learning vehicle for the younger professionals coming up, because they are able to donate maybe a little bit more time, but then they get exposure to the hive mind. And I think this idea of the hive mind is really amazing because if somebody's got a question, somebody somewhere in Letty will absolutely know the answer.

Jess Hrivnak: 58:06

And that is just really, really wonderful. And, yeah, I find it a very, very inspiring network to kind of even just stand on the outskirts of Fantastic.

Darren Evans: 58:20

Well, I wonder now if it would be a good time for us to talk about myths myths myths and debunk them. We're going to go to the demolition zone. Right, are you ready? Yeah sure, okay. So welcome back. We have got two construction items I'll call them on the table here. We've got one on my right hand side which is very circular in its nature, and the one on my left is quite square, a little bit higher, a little bit boxy. What do they represent to you?

Jess Hrivnak: 58:56

So I think you know it's maybe perhaps telling that I have gone against the brief here. And then just challenging.

Darren Evans: 59:05

The brief is kind of what we always ask people to do, isn't it?

Jess Hrivnak: 59:13

So, on the left, here is a sort of representation of the current kind of mindset of growth being quite linear, being always more in terms of physical dimension and, you know, expansion and more GDP, and that being quite possibly also quite an isolating trajectory because it doesn't bring everything with it. That's why some of it is lower than the other because there's not a sense of equity.

Jess Hrivnak: 59:52

On the other side, closer to you on the table, I've tried to model that sense of the carrying capacity of the planet and that collaborative nature, that much more circular aspect of how we need to reframe our whole thinking and all our systems, and that notion that you know at the bottom, you know we are bound to the biosphere. What the planet can carry and everything else has to sit like the Russian dolls stacked on top of each other within that, but also that connectedness. You know it is a collaborative game solving this problem. So that's what it's trying to represent. That's great.

Darren Evans: 1:00:37

Well, now that you've clarified that, and I know which one you're going to destroy, because one of them we won and the other one we don't right, correct. Okay, let's destroy the myth. Good stuff, yes, that is great.

Jess Hrivnak: 1:00:54

There we go, that's great.

Darren Evans: 1:00:58

It was very measured the way that you took that down. Yeah, very grateful, thank you. Well, it's been great having you on the podcast today. I really appreciate your time. Thanks for coming on.

Jess Hrivnak: 1:01:07

Thank you very much for inviting me.

Darren Evans: 1:01:09

I just wonder, before we go, is there anything that's on your mind, anything that you, just as a parting gift to us, just want to talk about?

Jess Hrivnak: 1:01:19

I think just a subject we've touched on before in conversations, but not necessarily today, was the mental health aspect of this topic climate change and I think it's really important that we recognize that. There are some amazing recent studies. Bath University surveyed 10,000 young people aged between 16 and 25 from 10 different countries, from Brazil to Nigeria, to America, to UK and asked them a series of questions about how they felt about climate change, and 84% of them said they were moderately worried and over 50% said they were extremely worried. And there's a big number. And what's more was that there's also really strong correlation over 50% was saying that they are frightened of the future.

Jess Hrivnak: 1:02:18

Right, and if we talk about the profession and we look at people who are doing really good stuff in the built environment space on environmental and climate change issues, they are people who've got a conscience and burnout is a massive thing and also disillusionment.

Jess Hrivnak: 1:02:41

So it's not just a thing.

Jess Hrivnak: 1:02:43

That is our young people.

Jess Hrivnak: 1:02:47

They are going to be the future of the profession, so they're coming already kind of primed with these concerns and we already see that people have burnout, who are working, donating their time we talked about Letty earlier and it is really tangible that people who are of a kind of constructive nature and want to do better, they will always give and give and give and give. And I think that recognizing that more in the profession, that we need to find ways of recognizing that climate change is a concern particularly, maybe, maybe particularly, for recent graduates and people coming up. And also we talked about that sense of agency that one of the aspects of the survey found that young people had this growing disillusionment and government and that feeling of not being able to have agency and their actions didn't matter. And I think, as we kind of work in practice and work with people and find ways of A recognizing that this is a thing but also try and really hold onto positive news stories and find that community, because A yes, we need to recognize the negative emotions.

Jess Hrivnak: 1:04:18

But we also need to take affirmative action and reframe. If you don't feel agency at the global scale, can you feel like you have agency within your community, within your practice, within the work that you do? I think there are real positive aspects. There are more and more practices going to trialing a four day work week because post pandemic we talked about this well-being people are recognizing and that kind of goes back to this model that actually, you know, we are very, very lucky here that we have the ability to worry about these bigger problems. We're not worrying about the next meal for the most part.

Jess Hrivnak: 1:05:08

So you know, what are the things that you know are going to make a difference to ourselves working less? What does that free us up to do? To experience more, to volunteer, to enrich our lives, enrich our community and find that connection. So I think, I think recognizing those emotions and that strain is really important when we're talking about the subject, because I wouldn't, like, you know, I don't want people to feel such despair about the subject and it is. You know, the headlines aren't, the science is not good.

Darren Evans: 1:05:47

But the great thing is, though, is people like yourself and the other great people that are in the industry that really do care and really put a lot of time and effort into this area. Things are being done, and so I would say, kind of the message is let's, let's join, let's be part of that community, because we've got Letty as an example of what can happen, that you don't need permission from government, you don't need sponsorship from the organization that you're working for. What you really need is other people that care and you're one of them.

Darren Evans: 1:06:21

I'm one of them. Other people on this podcast are them as well. So I think that's a great message.

Jess Hrivnak: 1:06:29

Thank you.

Darren Evans: 1:06:31

Thanks for coming on, thanks again.

Jess Hrivnak: 1:06:33

Thanks for having me.

Darren Evans: 1:07:00

I would love to maintain the quality of people that are joining me on this podcast, and so, in order for me to do that, I really need your help, and the way that you can help is by sharing the podcast with the people that you know that you think may have a slight interest in, or maybe a deep interest in, the guests and topics that are covered on this podcast.

Darren Evans: 1:07:23

It is all about construction, so that may lead your thinking towards people that are already in the construction industry, but I don't think we necessarily need to be that narrow with the people that we can reach out to. It could be somebody that's looking to get into an industry, but they're not quite sure what industry they want to get into. Maybe it's a teenager that is just finishing their GCSEs or starting A levels. Maybe it's somebody that's doing an English degree at university, but it's not quite sure what they want to do with that degree. So I invite you just to share this podcast with as many people that you know so that we can grow this community, so that we can maintain the quality, engaging conversations that we're having together. Thank you for your help.