A wide range of interesting articles that help you make informed decisions and deliver the best projects for your clients authored by our team of NBS subject specialists and construction industry contributors.
Sustainability
NBS Guide: Embodied Carbon Calculations
Learn how to align your carbon assessments with BIM workflows. This guide to Embodied Carbon Calculations, developed by NBS and Circular Ecology, sets out a practical, standardised approach to calculating the embodied carbon of building materials and products, and how to apply this data to BIM objects.
Must Reads
sustainability
The hidden cost of compliance: why architects are demanding a new era of product transparency
Few pieces of legislation have reshaped the UK construction industry as significantly as the Building Safety Act 2022 (BSA). Introduced to improve accountability, traceability and safety standards ...
Design and Specification
Brick slip cladding systems – the need for robust specification
This article from the NBS technical team outlines specification for brick slip technology, including history, technology, design, safety and testing.
sustainability
When product data creates risk, AluK delivers the clarity and support architects need
The need to build more homes, more quickly, has not changed. If anything, the pressure has intensified. However, the conversation around Modern Methods of Construction has evolved.
Sporting sustainability
2014 saw a glorious summer of sport, with the FIFA World Cup in Brazil, the annual Wimbledon championship, the Tour de France descending on Yorkshire, and the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.
SustainabilitySports grounds
Reduce embodied carbon from the start
Measure, compare and reduce upfront embodied carbon using trusted UK data and pre-built assemblies.
Barely a year seems to pass nowadays without flooding being a feature of the national news. It is an emotive subject due to the degree of devastation it can cause – not only can severe flooding ...
SustainabilityClimate change
Building Regulations: Changes to Part L
Approved Document Part L Conservation of fuel and power has been updated. The latest – 2013 – versions came into force in April 2014 and this programme gives you a heads-up on some of the key ...
SustainabilityStandards and Regulations
Government sustainability policies - A manifesto for mitigation
The countdown to the 2015 general election is about to begin. With 13 months to go, the parties are busily finalising their manifestos. Meanwhile the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) ...
SustainabilityGovernment policy
Biomass versus oil in rural Northumberland
Despite the presence of a pair of high pressure gas mains which cross North Northumberland from North to South, the route of which can be identified by swathes cut through woodland and red and white ...
Sustainability
Prefab housing is coming back, and this time it's permanent
In the late 1950s, more than a decade after the war and not long after the rock and roll explosion, Britain embarked on a house-building programme the like of which we have never seen before or since.
Design and SpecificationSustainability
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Wind (8/8)
This is the final part of an eight-part series of articles, Climate Change Adaptation in Buildings, examining the impact of climate change on the built environment, and the responses that can be made ...
SustainabilityClimate change
Drought (7/8)
This is the seventh in an eight-part series of articles, Climate Change Adaptation in Buildings, examining the impact of climate change on the built environment, and the responses that can be made to ...
SustainabilityClimate change
Subsidence (6/8)
This is the sixth in an eight-part series of articles, Climate Change Adaptation in Buildings, examining the impact of climate change on the built environment, and the responses that can be made to ...
Design and SpecificationSustainability
Flooding (5/8)
Solutions In the last article, the background and issues concerning the problems of flooding in buildings were examined. At a whole-building level, preliminary issues such as building siting and ...
SustainabilityClimate change
Flooding (4/8)
Background The issue of flooding is not a new one. Whilst overheating has become a relatively commonplace talking point in recent years, widespread areas of the UK have suffered from intermittent ...
SustainabilityClimate change
Excess heat (3/8)
This is the third in an eight-part series of articles, Climate Change Adaptation in Buildings, examining the impact of climate change on the built environment, and the responses that can be made to ...