ISCA members Cirtex and the NCTIR team are pleased to present this epic case study video.
Complete with interviews on the project site with key team members, and valuable insights into the pressures faced, and the obstacles overcome every day, this video will give you a new respect for the scope of the project and the people who made it happen.
IS Thought Leadership by Samuel Leigh
Australia, home of the oldest living society on earth takes pride in being one of the most ethically and culturally diverse countries in the world. That cultural diversity is now so profound that by 2016, 75% of the population identified with ancestry other than Australian. In infrastructure delivery, there is an opportunity to embrace a culturally diverse workforce by being open and adaptable. To provide training, careers and cultural engagement to capitalise on the opportunity diversity provides.
Post COVID, governments are facing the significant challenge of taking the lead role in re-igniting economic activity as unemployment rises, potentially to as high as 10%. Unemployment has hit various sectors unevenly. The ongoing travel and movement restrictions have devastated the aviation and tourism industries, hospitality is scrambling to survive and commercial builders are busy reassessing which projects are viable with less foreign investment in the apartment industry.
Governments will use infrastructure projects as a mechanism to stimulate economic activity across Australia. Infrastructure offers a unique opportunity for employment as it creates a platform for growth due to the sheer numbers of people and diverse range of skills required to deliver projects.
Infrastructure delivery also helps to spread economic benefit through a trickle-down effect across the many inputs it requires including subcontractors, consultants, services and materials. Project worksites are open dynamic places involving many hundreds of people from all walks of life working together for a shared purpose.
Construction is one of only a few industries where people can enter as unskilled and learn on the job. This is especially important in regional economies where there is simply less opportunity for training and employment than the large cities of Australia. When projects come to regional areas such as the rebuilding of the Newell Highway or the Inland Rail project there is rightly a focus on local engagement, employment and legacy programs.
Delivery of infrastructure can be a means to just give people a go. In Victoria the Brotherhood of St Laurance ‘Given the Chance’ program assists disadvantaged job seekers into sustainable paid employment by supporting employers to diversify their workforce and develop a socially inclusive culture. A similar program also exists in NSW with the ‘Infrastructure Skills Legacy Program’ a state wide program aimed at a providing opportunities for learning workers, apprentices, females, indigenous and people under 25. The overall aim of this program is to boost the number of skilled construction workers.
The number of non-English first language peoples coming into Australia each year creates a pool of talent that shouldn’t be overlooked. Canny businesses see this influx as an opportunity to gain engineers in a tight market. Programs like the Engineering Pathways Industry Cadetship recruits qualified engineers from refugee or asylum seeker backgrounds, bridging the gap between businesses and industry. The aim is to assist job seekers gain the connections and support they need to find their feet. The barriers often faced are about language and cultural differences, understanding what these are and adapting can open a door for willing and dedicated people to contribute to Australian projects.
Indigenous Australians might be our first engineers but they are one of the lowest represented groups in Australian engineering. Engineering Aid Australia since 1996 has focused on teaching young indigenous Australians about the opportunities of engineering and promoting careers which can be taken back to communities that need water, transport and energy projects.
The construction industry should stand up and do its part to help Australia respond to the current economic crisis and it must do so in a way that is inclusive and brings lasting benefit to the country. It is no longer enough to protect workers’ rights, provide safe work sites or respect the environment. Value for money and efficient programs are a ‘given’ – clients require more from delivery partners. A project cannot just be the ribbon cutting at the end. We must deliver infrastructure for communities and customers, which means placing their needs at the front and centre of how operate.
People have always been at the centre of infrastructure builds. Think of the walking trail through the landscape, the story circle on the riverbank, the road, the tunnel or balance cantilever bridge – all infrastructure, old and new, is at its heart about connecting people and places through the landscape.
Successfully embracing the opportunity of cultural diversity requires a willingness to listen, to seek help from local service providers and above all to have open mind. Leadership groups should allow their delivery teams to be responsive and have autonomy to try new things.
When we commit to working together during project delivery, we can provide benefits for all the people of Australia. The development of infrastructure is short term in the build, but long term in the legacy it leaves behind.
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Fulton Hogan is a family and employee owned business that prides itself for living its values and is committed to the social purpose of ‘building communities’.
Samuel Leigh, Environmental Manager for Fulton Hogan’s Eastern Construction Region in NSW
Thursday 30 April 2020, Sydney: Infrastructure will play a central role in Australia’s economic recovery – and sustainable infrastructure can deliver an even bigger rebound, finds new research commissioned by the Australian Infrastructure Sustainability Council (ISCA).
ISCA’s study, IS Rating Scheme Return on Investment, finds infrastructure projects rated under the IS Rating Scheme will deliver up to $2.40 in benefit for every dollar spent.
According to Ainsley Simpson, Chief Executive Officer of ISCA, the economic multiplier effect for infrastructure expenditure is well documented – but this fresh research underscores an even bigger upside.
“Over the next few years, infrastructure will play a mission critical role in our economic rebound – but we must ensure the money we spend today can be leveraged to maximise environmental, social, cultural and economic benefits tomorrow,” Ms Simpson says.
“Governments know that public infrastructure is a great economic multiplier – and that every dollar they invest in public infrastructure delivers around four dollars in GDP value over the life of the asset.
“Over and above this productivity dividend, our research finds IS Ratings are set to deliver a minimum of $1.60 in benefit for every dollar spent – and this figure could be as high as $2.40 in benefit.”
ISCA’s IS Rating Scheme was launched in 2012, and has since measured the social, environmental, governance and cultural outcomes delivered by more than $170 billion major infrastructure projects.
The independent cost benefit analysis undertaken by RPS Group monetised benefits such as carbon, water, ecology and air emissions. IS-certified as-built assets have delivered accumulated reductions of 14% in energy, 27% in water and 31% in materials when compared to standard practice.
Ms Simpson says the ROI study does not quantify wider social value such as health outcomes and human capital development.
“Our study makes the business case clear: sustainability and profitability are not mutually exclusive. Importantly, the non-market benefits of infrastructure should not be limited to major projects. If uptake of the IS Rating Scheme was doubled, the net benefit would soar to $90.7 million. All infrastructure – urban and regional, large and small, new and ageing – can deliver more for our communities.”
“What we also know from the research is that pursuing an IS Rating upskills the workforce, encourages innovation and drives process improvements. Applying the IS Rating scheme to infrastructure projects trains people to think more strategically across the asset lifecycle, which in turn enhances procurement and supply chain efficiencies.”
Given the central role that infrastructure will play in the next wave of fiscal stimulus, ISCA is calling on all governments to rebound with continued determination and decisive leadership, with five practical actions:
“Infrastructure investment can help us achieve strong economic outcomes for Australia as we bounce back from the Covid-19 crisis. But we need to ensure we are spending our money wisely,” Ms Simpson adds.
“Infrastructure Australia estimates that $20 billion worth of infrastructure projects were delayed, cancelled or mothballed over the last decade due to community opposition. Construction fatigue has put pressure on communities and jeopardised the industry’s social license.
“By mandating the IS Rating Scheme, governments can help us pivot from past practices and invest in sustainable infrastructure that de-risks assets, boosts financial performance and, most importantly, builds a better future for generations.”
Download the ISCA’s full cost benefit analysis and executive summary.
The twin crises of the Black Summer bushfires and Covid-19 have tested the resilience of Australia’s systems and recalibrated business-as-usual. The challenges and consequences ahead are interconnected – but so are the dividends that sustainable infrastructure can deliver to communities.
In few short months, we’ve stress-tested the systems and structures that underpin our nation. We’ve exposed weaknesses in our supply chains, inequities in our distribution of essential services and gained a new appreciation of social infrastructure at the heart of our communities.
Now, as governments gear up to stimulate the economy, we know spending on infrastructure will play a central role in our economic rebound. But just as the challenges we face are complex and interconnected, our infrastructure investment must deliver on a host of complex and interconnected priorities.
Governments know that public infrastructure is a great economic multiplier – and that every dollar they invest in public infrastructure delivers around four dollars in GDP value over the life of the asset.
But now, a new cost benefit analysis undertaken by RPS Group illustrates how sustainable infrastructure can deliver an even bigger dividend.
ISCA’s IS Rating Scheme was launched in 2012, and has since measured the social, environmental, governance and cultural outcomes delivered by more than $200 billion major infrastructure projects.
The study, IS Rating Scheme Return On Investment, finds infrastructure projects IS-rated projects are set to deliver a minimum of $1.60 in benefit for every dollar spent – and this figure could be as high as $2.40 in benefit.
What’s more, if the uptake of the IS Rating Scheme was doubled, the net benefit would soar to $90 million.
The independent analysis monetised benefits such as carbon, water, ecology and air emissions, because we know IS-certified as-built assets deliver average savings of 18% in energy, 29% in water and 31% in materials when compared to standard practice.
While the study does not quantify wider social value such as health outcomes and human capital development, we have emerging evidence that illustrates the many qualitative benefits.
We know pursuing an IS Rating upskills the workforce, encourages innovation and drives process improvements. People learn to think more strategically across the asset lifecycle, which in turn enhances procurement and supply chain efficiencies. IS ratings also de-risk assets and boost financial performance.
Most importantly, infrastructure that considers emissions, resilience, liveability and long-term community value builds a better future for generations.
ISCA has embarked on a campaign that calls on all governments to embrace five practical actions:
Over the next few years, infrastructure will play a mission critical role in our economic rebound. But we must ensure the money we spend today leverages not only the economic benefits, but the environmental, social and cultural benefits too.
Download the study below
ISCA ROI Study_Exec Summary 2020
ISCA ROI Study_Full report 2020
By Toto Vu-Duc
What was the opportunity?
Hobsonville is undergoing significant development to help accommodate Auckland’s growing population. Over 16 hectares of land in the north-western suburb of Scott Point was identified to build New Zealand’s first certified sustainable sports park, a feature the community can be proud of and will demonstrate Auckland Council’s commitment to a sustainable future.
This context created an ideal opportunity for Council to undertake a procurement process fully leveraging the organisation’s sustainable procurement framework, seeking a lead contractor to “achieve this vision and be responsible for the day-to-day delivery of the construction works in a fully sustainable manner,” as was advertised in the original request for interest.
Sustainable Procurement at Auckland Council
Sustainable procurement differs from business-as-usual contract procurement in its valuation criteria. Sustainable procurement emphasises a “triple bottom line” (economic, environmental and social values) which is more comprehensive than the standard procurement that only focuses on the “bottom line” (financial cost).
At Auckland Council, our Group Sustainable Procurement Framework goes beyond a triple-bottom-line to include cultural values, outlining a total of four “well-beings” used for procurement evaluation and contract management (Figure 1). Auckland Council is committed to valuing and promoting Māori identity under Te Tiriti o Waitangi and the Auckland Plan. Therefore the framework was designed to deliver positive Māori outcomes and align with the key role played by mana whenua in a sustainable Auckland across these four well-beings:
Figure 1 Auckland Council Group Sustainable Procurement Framework well-beings
Under the framework, sustainable procurement is tailored to the services procured, monitored and measured throughout the procurement lifecycle to achieve maximum benefit for Aucklanders.
What did we deliver?
The early contractor involvement procurement phase tailored the Group Sustainable Procurement Framework to address specific selection criteria under its four well-beings and included guidance to support interested parties with their submissions. The response forms provided in the tender package covered all four well-beings and examples of acceptable evidence. Excerpts from this guidance included:
Cultural well-being
Acceptable evidence included company policies, procedures, statistics and reporting demonstrating how the applicants actively supports Māori and Pasifika-owned businesses (e.g. He Waka Eke Noa engagement), or the embedding of tikanga and/or te reo Māori into its business protocols.
Economic well-being
Evidence examples included description of a previous project yielding whole-of-life savings, either through whole-of-life modelling in decision-making or the use of innovative technology.
Environmental well-being
Applicants could demonstrate this well-being through company reporting including energy, water, waste and carbon, policies and procedures that demonstrate a commitment to sustainability. Relevant independent certifications (e.g. ISO 14001 or Enviromark Diamond) were also acceptable.
Social well-being
As with environmental well-being, applicants could also demonstrate social well-being using a relevant independent certification (e.g. EDGE, Rainbow Tick, ISO 26000).We also accepted company policies, reporting, and career pathway programmes as evidence of commitment to a diverse and inclusive workforce and social well-being.
The Result
After a robust procurement process, HEB Construction was successful in winning the contract for the next phase of the park development. In addition to providing evidence of their technical ability to deliver the project, HEB’s tender package included business reporting on climate action (such as an environmental outcome of reducing their company fleet’s fuel consumption by 10% during their previous financial year) and social well-being (as demonstrated by career pathway development through Māori & Pasifika Trades Training). The tender team also proposed sustainable innovation ideas specific to Scott Point, as seen in the background plan. Overall, the proposal package showcased HEB’s experience that will enable them to deliver the requested services for this project. The package also outlined how they provided that service on a day-to-day level to deliver sustainable outcomes across the company and specifically for the tendered project.
Sustainable procurement is an integral part of delivering sustainable business practices within projects and organisations. Integrating a sustainable procurement approach into your project or organisation presents an opportunity to provide better outcomes through reducing risk, adding value and encouraging innovation. Done well, sustainable procurement adds positive environmental, social and economic impacts throughout the whole lifecycle of an asset, goods and services. At a practical level it also encourages cooperation, buy-in and better communication between purchasers, suppliers and stakeholders.
The steps to achieving sustainable procurement require an understanding that sustainability needs to be integrated as a holistic concept across a project or organisation, not as an add-on or afterthought to tradition business as usual practices. Over the past three decades, many iconic companies that have publicly professed to be leading practitioners of sustainable behaviour have then been nailed to the wall over their ignorance, complacency or naiveté around what is happening in their supply chains. Some of the underlying causes of this include:
There are some fundamental questions that projects and organisations need to be asking of themselves so the efforts they make to address risk and encourage sustainable practices within their supply chain are well focused and meaningful, rather than futile and wasteful “window dressing”. These questions include:
While there are no generic answers to these, I can offer some thinking to help contextualise such questions so that you can start considering the best way forward. My involvement has been primarily to help organisations and projects develop and implement policies to encourage sustainable supplier practices, writing supplier codes of conduct, and designing and delivering supplier audit programs. My comments below are based on what those experiences have revealed.
What are we really asking of our suppliers?
What are we trying to do and why?
Many supplier programs are vague about their intended goals for the project and desired outcomes for the suppliers; ending up unfocussed, expensive and lacking performance measures. Are you trying to manage real risk in your supply chain or sending a message to the market about your commitment to responsible business behaviour?
Being clear on this helps you to decide whether you should be going down a ‘compliance’ style approach setting minimum acceptable standards of supplier performance, or an ‘encouragement’ based approach supporting suppliers to progressively change their behaviour, and go beyond compliance. If it is be more compliance focused, will your approach be punitive (comply or else) or more one of ‘gently’ raising the bar over time (recognising your likely limited resources and that of your suppliers)? If you’re looking to be ‘supportive’, what are you prepared (and resourced) to do for suppliers by way of helping them?
Do as we say, or do as we do?
If you are going down the ‘compliance’ route, you may be putting your credibility on the line. “Do as we do”, rather than “do as we say” should always underpin such an approach – firstly by checking and demonstrating that your own house is in order on the social, environmental and governance performance areas that you’re expecting suppliers to meet in order to avoid a classic and often highly visible double standard. If there are significant shortcomings in your own sustainability performance, you have two choices: wait until your own act is together before demanding compliance from your suppliers, or transparently acknowledge to your suppliers that your business still has work to do to lift its sustainability game, and encourage them to work with you to improve outcomes.
Where do we begin?
Identify the breadth or focus of your approach;
A successful approach is predicated on tying together program intent, available resources and risk evaluation. Are you intending to engage your whole supply chain? Should your focus be primarily on your high spend, first tier suppliers, or on suppliers operating in particularly high risk sectors (e.g. PPE gear, labour contracting, etc.) or in geographical regions known for poor labour, governance, safety or environmental standards? It is worth identifying what information currently resides in your procurement department about supplier performance that can help identify higher risk or habitually poorly performing suppliers. If supplier risk information is lacking, then your top 10 or 20 suppliers by spend may be a useful starting point.
Supplier sustainability schemes can be overly ambitious in what they are trying to achieve. Several years back I read with interest a major bank’s elaborate plans to launch a sustainable supply chain program involving multiple supplier audits in the first year. By the end of year one, they announced a grand total of one supplier had been audited (from the tone of their report I don’t think they quite understood the actual message that outcome sent to the market). Most, if not all, organisations have to rationalise their program scope and intent with their available resources, so don’t try to do it all at once.
Align and marshal your forces
Many projects and organisations make the mistake of running supplier sustainability programs as a solo exercise out of their sustainability departments. To get the best possible outcomes you need to engage both your risk function and your procurement team in the development of the approach, including where to target the program and how it will be delivered. You will also likely benefit from the public endorsement of your Board or senior executive to give it the legitimacy it needs to be taken seriously both internally and externally.
Get your corporate communications team on board to align and promote the program with other corporate initiatives and help you craft a clear and unambiguous message to suppliers about what you are planning to do, when and why. Suppliers will no doubt have questions about this, so be prepared to respond to them in a coordinated, consistent manner across the business.
How should we design and then test our approach?
Engage your internal and external stakeholders in designing the approach
Trying to design a supplier program in isolation from those who will use it (internal stakeholders) and those who will be subject to it (suppliers) is not particularly smart. Sustainable supplier policies, supplier codes of conduct, supplier questionnaires, and supplier audit models all need to be considered from both the user and the recipient point of view. Getting them engaged not only provides invaluable feedback on aspects such as relevancy of criteria, affordability, practicality and integration but also creates buy-in to the process on both sides. Suppliers should have a say in what you are asking of them. There is, for many suppliers, a high degree of discomfort with what can be perceived as a client essentially imposing their values and principles on them. To then be held to account for something they had little or no say in developing can be particularly challenging for them.
Run a pilot and assess the results
To be successful, all the elements of your supply chain sustainability program need to integrate seamlessly. For example; your policy, code of conduct, audit tools and audit approach all need to be consistent and complete before you can confidently roll out the program across your chosen suppliers. The only way to gain this confidence is to test them in a controlled, contained and ‘safe’ manner. Running a pilot amongst a select group of suppliers or within one particular procurement area provides such an opportunity to demonstrate what works and what doesn’t.
I would also urge you to consider piloting a range of different models of auditing if you are heading down the supplier performance verification route. Supplier audit programs are a trade-off between adequate coverage of your supplier base versus sufficient evidence-gathering so as to minimise risk. “Light touch” audit approaches (usually largely desktop review-based) are relatively cheap and cheerful but are barely worth the money they cost. In many cases they are worse than no audit at all as they run a significant risk of creating a false sense of security and comfort for you about your suppliers. Some sort of onsite verification is usually essential, given our experience that suppliers are highly variable in relation to the “accuracy” of their responses to questionnaires.
But ‘onsite’ doesn’t necessarily mean expensive. You may want to have a ‘lighter’ touch model for your low risk or low spend suppliers, but at the same time retain something significantly more intensive (and therefore more cost and time demanding) for high risk, high spend, major suppliers.
…….and stick with it
Be prepared to change your approach if it isn’t delivering the outcomes and confidence you need. There is little doubt that your process will (and needs to) evolve over time as you gain more experience, or take it offshore, or commence second round audits of suppliers. And do continue to seek input from your suppliers, both during and well beyond the pilot phase, to determine whether they are truly gaining some benefits too. Bringing suppliers together to compare experiences with your approach can be a useful exercise, but be prepared for a range of views and be willing to respond to that feedback.
You are not likely to see substantive change overnight in terms of sustainable supplier behaviour. Many of your suppliers, even some of the smaller ones, are probably doing okay from a sustainability perspective already, and may even be doing better than your own organsiation. It’s the laggards that you’re most trying to reach, assess, influence or remove.
Be smart about not painting all suppliers with the one brush. Acknowledge and reward good supplier performance more often than berating those who fall short. Celebrate and promote their achievements to their peers in your supply chain – a particularly effective means to stimulate a response. A PwC survey some years back revealed that 81 per cent of businesses who rate sustainability as important favour collaborating with their suppliers to create a responsible supply chain footprint and procurement framework.
The skeleton doesn’t have to stay in the closet. Or at least check that both the skeleton and the closet were made sustainably.
Where can we get help?
ISCA has developed a virtual training course that enables participants to understand how they can implement a more sustainable approach to procurement aligned to the IS Rating criteria, with the aim of creating procurement outcomes that reduce negative externalities while supporting contractual requirements, financial targets and risk management.
This course aims to equip participants with the tools and skills to enable sustainable procurement in their workplace, with a focus on implementing the procurement criteria embraced within the IS Rating tool. This is not just in relation to IS ratings but also in relation to general procurement practices within organisations to enhance social and environmental impacts and drive better economic outcomes. This virtual training is targeted at Sustainability Managers, Project Managers, Procurement Managers, and Sustainability Consultant.
A mixture of instructional presentations and practical exercises will help participants to:
If you would like to better develop your skills in sustainable procurement, register here.
Kiwi kids from Cape Reinga in the far north all the way to Bluff in Southland have the chance to be part of New Zealand’s biggest-ever transport infrastructure project – the City Rail Link (CRL) in Auckland.
Children between five and 11 are invited to paint and draw images that will be then be fired onto ceramic tiles and used to decorate walls in a new underground railway station in the middle of Auckland.
“Children are fantastic dreamers with great imaginations, and we want them to fire up those skills as artists and give us pictures of where they would like to go by train once our underground railway is built,” says the Chief Executive of City Rail Link Ltd CRL Ltd), Dr Sean Sweeney. “Their journeys could be anywhere – taking the train down the road from home to the local diary or heading off into outer space or anywhere they like in between.”
Dr Sweeney says it is easy for children to show off their artistic skills.
Dr Sweeney says there are a couple of reasons why City Rail Link wants to connect with the country’s youngest artists.
“They will be part of the biggest art project in New Zealand. If they don’t live here already, there’s a good chance they are likely to visit the city on holiday when they can see their picture. It’s also a chance for children to be part of one of the country’s most important building projects – CRL is important for Auckland but building a railway under a city is complicated and our workers will be learning new skills on the job that they can then use on other building sites all over New Zealand.”
Dr Sweeney says children’s artwork will be displayed permanently at the Aotea Station, which will be New Zealand’s busiest when it opens in four years.
“Tens of thousands of people will walk past the children’s art wall every day on their way to work, or to home, but we have a very big wall to fill. We’ve already got 3,000 fantastic and colourful pictures but we need thousands more to fill the space and make the wall an exciting part of the station.
“With the Easter break coming up and schools still closed because of the lockdown we hope there is plenty of creative time for children to show off their awesome artistic talents. The tiles will be an important part of CRL – a fantastic legacy lasting 100 years or more,” Dr Sweeney says.
The City Rail Link is New Zealand’s first underground railway line. It is 3.45 kilometres long and its tunnels are being built under central Auckland.
It will change the iconic Britomart Transport Centre in downtown Auckland from a dead-end one-way station into a two-way through station that connects with other lines to allow more trains and more people to get in and out of the city. Aotea is one of two underground stations being built on the line, which is planned to open in 2024.
More information about CRL can be found at https://www.cityraillink.co.nz/
By Scott Hook
The concept of resilience offers an opportunity to break down the silos between climate change adaptation, disaster risk reduction and green growth to enable action on risk at all phases of planning, procurement, maintenance and evaluation, given their multiple linkages with all aspects of infrastructure.
How Resilience is Important for InfrastructureInfrastructure investments involve large and irreversible investments with long asset lives, which makes consideration of resilience particularly relevant. Given that many infrastructure investments have an economic life expectancy of 30 years or more, it is important to note that infrastructure is sensitive to both climatic conditions prevailing during its construction and to the climate variations over decades of use, and these aspects need to be planned for in the design phase and incorporated into the maintenance and operation. The greening of infrastructure is also an increasing requirement by clients in communities, governments and the private sector.
Resilience – one name many different actions
Resilience has its roots in the latin, “resiliere,” meaning to bounce back after a shock and was probably first used to describe the capacity of material to absorb energy without suffering permanent deformation. It was further popularized in many different fields such as ecology, economics, child psychology and engineering. Some of the relevant definitions include:
Figure 2
The value of resilience is that it can be useful as a unifying concept for adaptation, sustainable development and disaster risk reduction. By putting resilience at the core of planning, as opposed to one of adaptation, sustainable development or disaster risk reduction, various actors can pursue solutions that contribute to all three global agendas. Sectoral approaches to planning, centred on resilience, provide an opportunity to foster better policy integration. Hence, the extensive literature that has arisen in the last several years on building and maintaining resilient infrastructure.
Building Resilience
Much of the discussion on resilience for infrastructure has been about reducing the risk of long-term detrimental impacts induced by specific adverse events. Some of the discrete aspects refer to:
In essence this conceptualisation of resilience means that building resilience requires interventions that strengthen the three components to maintain the status quo (absorptive), incorporate incremental change (adaptive) and finally the capacity to undertake structural change (transformative resilience) together. It also means that in their response to events, systems don’t simply try to reduce the detrimental impact of these shocks; they also try to (a) minimize the costs it takes to respond and (b) to recover from these events although this may not to be to the same spot prior to the shock. Resilience outcomes therefore result from trade-offs and combinations between three different dynamics depending on the (i) intensity of shock, (ii) costs of impact, and (iii) costs of response. The main factors that can affect infrastructure resilience are:
There is common agreement that as the resilience of a system declines, the magnitude of a shock from which it cannot recover gets smaller and smaller. In general, resilience shifts attention from purely growth and efficiency to time and resources needed for recovery and flexibility. Growth and efficiency alone can often lead systems, businesses and infrastructure into fragile rigidities, exposing them to turbulent transformations. So to conclude, definitions of “resilience” include several key-elements:
a) Resilience concerns infrastructure at all stages of its design, finance, construction, operation, and maintenance.
b) Resilience concerns the ability to manage exposure to hazards, shocks or stresses through maintaining or transforming standards aiming at long-term prospects
c) Resilience requires a balance between rigidity to spring back and flexibility to enable ongoing progress and development of these systems.
Resilience is, therefore, a dynamic process and is characterised by multiple adaptive cycles interacting across a range of scales and dimensions. Fostering resilience by itself, however, is difficult as is measuring resilience.
If you would like submit a thought leadership piece, our topic in April is ‘Sustainable Precurement’. For more information on submission guidelines, click here.
Why are we working remotely?
The safety of our team and our community is important to us, which is why we’re following the advice provided by Australian Government’s Chief Medical Officer and New Zealand Ministry of Health to do our bit to help flatten the curve and practice social distancing.
How long will ISCA implement the social distancing/ digital connections?
Like you, ISCA will continue to monitor COVID 19 closely and follow the expert advice from the Australian and New Zealand Governments. We will be pro-active with our communication and as soon as the situation changes, we will let our valued stakeholders know.
What does that mean for meetings and events?
ISCA will continue to connect and engage with you digitally. Most scheduled meetings will go ahead, and events are being planned as far as possible to be held via video conferencing. Please get in touch with our Engagement team for more details via events@isca.org.au
What about Training?
ISCA’s most popular training course Infrastructure Sustainability for Professionals will be delivered online. We are also transforming other courses to be offered digitally as well. With more businesses working remotely, what better use of the time you save not commuting, than upskilling with ISCA’s online course offering. Please get in touch with our training team for more details via training@isca.org.au
What about Ratings?
ISCA will continue to support rating projects with all face-to-face interactions occurring via video conferencing. We will maintain our service, we’re only changing the method in which we connect.
How we will we contact ISCA?
The ISCA office phone will be diverted so we are still readily available to help you out. You can contact all your favourite ISCA staff members via their mobiles, email, Microsoft Teams accounts and through LinkedIn
Manaaki whenua, Manaaki tangata, Haere whakamua
Care for the land, care for the people, go forward
The Infrastructure Sustainability Council is Australia and New Zealand’s authority on sustainable infrastructure. Our purpose is to ensure all infrastructure delivers cultural, social, environmental and economic benefits. We are a significant contributor by leading, coordinating and reinforcing accelerated climate action in infrastructure.
Climate action is more than decarbonisation.
Infrastructure assets being planned, delivered, and managed today will last many decades. These assets and networks must deliver environmental, social, economic, and cultural benefits that are intergenerational; for those here today and the many more to come.
Climate action involves a duty to communities, the workforce, the environment, and the economy. Climate action:
The Council will play a leading role in helping build an enabling ecosystem to deliver net zero by 2050. With industry-led accelerated action to keep climate warming within 1.5 degrees, together we will start to focus on delivering climate positivity. We will work with our member base of leaders, to advocate and accelerate policy, planning, procurement, and positive practice to scale climate action for all. This means setting a trajectory to reach at least 50% reduction in real emissions by 2030[1], with an ability to enable the achievement of net-positive places early into the next decade.
The Infrastructure Sustainability Council will accelerate climate action by:
[1] Based off 2005 levels
Leadership is critical in achieving net zero. The Council’s members are the most engaged and progressive, and represent all representative of the most progressive parts organisations in our complex sector. The infrastructure sector is diverse with varying levels of awareness and commitment to climate action. The Council’s inclusive approach to catalysing impactful change across industry planning, policy, procurement, and practice will be to:
The Council will track and publish progress annually in our Impacts Report.
Toitū te marae a Tāne-Mahuta, toitū te marae a Tangaroa, toitū te tangata
If land is well and the sea is well, the people will thrive.
The summer experienced by Australia over the last few months appears to have shaken the nation to its core. While time will only tell if the bushfires of 2019/2020 prove to be a seminal turning point for change, at a minimum, they have provided a very vivid insight into what the future looks like if we are not able to adequately prevent the catastrophic impact related to climate change, and how much work is required to improve our resilience and adaptive capacity to predicted short and long-term changes.
Climate change, like many sustainability issues, has been traditionally siloed off to be considered ‘just an environmental issue’. One thing the Australian summer fires have clearly demonstrated is the connection and interdependence of the natural environment, human wellbeing, community livelihood and economic productivity. The fires have impacted people’s health and wellbeing, all essential services, food supply chains, the operational viability of businesses large and small, our land and water-based ecosystems and people’s access to housing and shelter. It has also elevated the importance of our culture and sense of community and just how critical it is for government, business and communities to work together. The impacts from this event due to its scale, extent and duration, have been felt in the areas directly impacted by the fires, across the nation, and touched almost every part of the globe.
Figure 1. A kangaroo rushes past a burning house in Lake Conjola, New South Wales.
Working in the infrastructure sector, it has also been made abundantly clear the critical role infrastructure plays in enabling people’s lives, communities, economy and the environment. The significance of infrastructure in ensuring the resilience of communities, regions and cities, cannot be understated. Critical road access has been affected for days, wide-scale electricity grid black-outs and essential drinking water supplies compromised. The normal functioning of hospitals, schools and airports has been impacted. Public and open spaces are unusable and even hazardous.
The asset loss is significant with value estimated in the billions. The community fabric shaken but not irreparably, as Australians will always find a way, even though the grief for the loss of life and our cherished natural environment is deep and likely to linger for many years to come. This tragedy is not without its silver linings though, the sense of community and generosity of spirit and contribution has been overwhelming. The strength and determination to carry-on, is truly inspiring. The growing groundswell to act now and not accept these circumstances as the new business-as-usual, promising, and perhaps encouraging if, as a global community, we do in fact learn and genuinely act now.
Figure 2. ADF crews clearing the route into Mallacoota.
For the infrastructure industry, now is the time to deeply reflect and learn from the many lessons this crisis has brought into stark focus. Most critically we need to respond with resolve and urgency on how we plan, how we invest, where we build, the policies we set forth and standby unwaveringly. In short, how quickly we choose to change will define our collective future.
While New Year’s Eve was a more sombre event than usual in Australia, it saw the arrival of another milestone – a new decade and the start of a ten-year countdown for us to collectively achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Once the dust and ash has settled, the connection between the two events should not go unnoticed. The Australian summer fires provide a preview for the world how much is at stake if we fall short of achieving these goals, and, if we are unable to make the changes required, the amount of adaptation required to become resilient enough to survive and thrive in the future. The time for intention is over, the time for impact is now.
When adopting and responding to the SDGs, working strategically has been as interpreted as working narrowly. It isn’t uncommon to see organisations, private and public, sell themselves short by identifying or choosing only a few of the SDGs to focus on. What the fires have proven is that it is almost impossible for any of the goals to sit in isolation– they impact each other, influencing overall levels of vulnerability, resilience and success. This understanding is particularly important for the current custodians of infrastructure’s long-term asset base and key enabler.
Figure 3. ISCA directly contribues to 15 of the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals.
The Infrastructure Sustainability Council of Australia (ISCA) is a not-for-profit peak body operating in Australia and New Zealand with the purpose of enabling sustainability outcomes from all infrastructure. ISCA own and administer the Infrastructure Sustainability (IS) Ratings Scheme, an industry-wide standard for planning, design, construction and operations of infrastructure assets. ISCA has certified a total of 74 projects worth a collective AUD$52 billion; with AUD$106 currently underway.; The IS Rating Scheme has been recognised by Stanford University as the most comprehensive infrastructure sustainability standard globally. IS Rating Scheme aligns and directly integrates 15 of the 17 SDGs, and, depending on the specific context of an asset has the ability to impact all 17.
One of the key benefits our stakeholders regularly report is that the IS Rating Scheme provides a single, consistent definition and conceptualisation of how to achieve sustainability best-practice for infrastructure assets. This approach has enabled awareness and capability to build across projects and supply chains, create a single focus to drive impact, and measure outcomes across the industry. Through the IS Scheme certified As-Built projects have collectively avoided a total of 2.2 million tonnes of CO2 emissions – not just a significant saving for the environment but representative of a total of AUD$76.1 million of avoided cost. Across the same timeframe, projects have collectively reported a total 18% reduction in energy usage, 31% in water and 29% in materials used. ISCA is advancing the third-party assured measurement and transparent benchmarking of infrastructure, including the more complex outcomes to measure at scale– the cultural, social, and economic.
Investment in sustainable infrastructure is good for business. In a cost-benefit analysis undertaken in 2019 by RPS, it was determined that for every AUD$1.00 invested in projects implementing the IS Rating Scheme, between AUD$1.50 and AUD$4.10 was returned. We know this to be conservative as it does not include the monetisation of the more intangible impacts for community, environment and business. What this analysis has done, however, is to give the industry, and its investors, the confidence and business case to continue to drive a sustainability agenda and focus on leveraging that investment for impact – doing well, while doing good.
As ISCA considers the decade ahead, we are clear in our focus that working in partnership will maximise and enabling even greater positive change through infrastructure. We will continue to push the agenda forward, founded on the SDGs, to ensure that all infrastructure delivers cultural, social, environmental and economic benefits. This means placing collaboration at the heart of what we do. The signing of our MOU with GRESB to work together to progress industry alignment and collaboration is just one example of our commitment to doing this. Another was the launch of an industry guide for dual certification with the Green Building Council of Australia – making clear how Green Star and IS Rating Schemes interface for precinct scale and highly integrated assets.
As we start a new decade, our focus is now on how ESG becomes integrated and integral to business and asset strategy so that we can deliver our impact aspirations for all of infrastructures’ current and future beneficiaries. In another ten years’ time, here’s to reflecting on how well we all met the global challenges, at pace and scale, and how this moment of crisis proved to be a seminal turning point in the way we do business.
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About the Company
ISCA specialise in the facilitation and development of industry led performance based governance and reporting frameworks. Providing sustainability outcomes in infrastructure is through the development and facilitation of the IS rating scheme. IS rating scheme is an industry-compiled voluntary sustainability performance rating scheme evaluating all infrastructure asset classes beyond regulatory standards. The IS rating scheme is ANZ’s only comprehensive rating scheme for evaluating sustainability across planning, design, construction and operation of infrastructure.
The Role
The Business Development Manager will drive member value as well as annual acquisition activities. They will engage with existing members and establish new relationships through the infrastructure supply chain.
Qualifications and Experiences
To apply online please click the ‘Apply’ button below. For a confidential discussion about this role please contact Jessica Morley: 0405105072 Jessica.Morley@acrworld.com
