Dr. Josephina Lindblom:

I do not know about the specific situation in Ireland but what I hear from other countries is that there has to be an energy audit before a new building is handed over. They are starting to look at changing that energy audit into a whole-life carbon audit. This could of course also be done in respect of renovations, checking the performance at the end of the work. I would also like to stress that across the EU, it is rare that architectural studies include life cycle thinking. I want to flag that to the committee. One can easily become an architect anywhere in Europe without knowing about circularity or life cycle thinking.

They can be small courses, which can be added to the programme by choice, but it is not part of the core education. That could also be something to think about.