Significant leaps and gains have been made in engineering and construction around sustainability, efficiency and resilience. The sectors have responded admirably and at pace with innovative advancements and solutions in designs, processes and materials.
However, as the pace and impact of climate change picks up and merges with other pressing externalities such as biodiversity loss and rising levels of social inequality,, the current mindset around the minimisation of harm is shifting to another, more powerful one. To move beyond sustainability, how can engineers shift focus from impact reduction to net-positive outcomes?
Where sustainability seeks to manage and reduce negative environmental and social impacts for communities, ecosystems and future generations, regenerative design goes one step further. Regenerative design asks how a project can give more than it takes.
In this white paper, SMEC explores the concept of regenerative design from the practical perspective of engineering and construction. What does it mean in practice? How is it being applied right now in Australia and elsewhere?
“We’ve seen an evolution of sustainable design practice over the past 50 years,” says Rebecca Miller, Chair, Sustainability Council of Excellence, SJ Group, of which SMEC is a subsidiary.
“Regenerative design is that next evolution. It’s that next piece. It’s about leaving a positive legacy and delivering positive outcomes across climate and carbon, people, communities, nature and biodiversity.”
In an era in which infrastructure projects are becoming infinitely more complex, regenerative design introduces aREgen opportunity to bring ecological health, cultural and societal knowledge/wellbeing and engineering innovation into greater alignment. It is about taking all we have learned so far about sustainability in engineering and supercharging it.
Regenerative design represents a shift from damage minimisation to maximising benefit. This paper discusses pathways and ideas to help this become a reality.
