The integration of lifecycle carbon analysis in the design of an office building’s façade enabled a more sustainable design and material selection.
KPF performed a lifecycle analysis (LCA) of 17xM, a mid-rise office building, to understand how the façade materials, module width, and floor-to-floor heights impacted the project’s total embodied carbon footprint. In commercial new construction, curtain wall façade systems can account for up to 20% of material GHG emissions over a building’s lifespan, with aluminum framing driving most of the environmental impact.
KPF’s lifecycle assessment (LCA) tools allow our teams to compare complex curtain wall design options holistically, evaluating whole lifecycle trade-offs between embodied and operational carbon. As part of this study, KPF developed a lifecycle inventory (LCI) of material quantities for each wall type and design scenario for the building, which was cross-referenced with an internal dataset of building materials’ climate impacts to understand how each decision affected the overall outcome. The study explored opportunities for global warming potential (GWP) impact reduction through material selection and specification for critical wall components such as aluminum frames and cladding.
