Whole Life-Cycle Carbon Assessments Guidance

Engagement on the Whole Life-Cycle Carbon Assessment guidance has now ended. 

The guidance has now been published and can be found on the GLA website: https://www.london.gov.uk/what-we-do/planning/implementing-london-plan/london-plan-guidance/whole-life-cycle-carbon-assessments-guidance  

The Mayor is committed to London becoming a zero-carbon city. This will require reduction of all greenhouse gases, of which carbon dioxide is the most prominent. 

Whole Life-Cycle Carbon (WLC) emissions are the carbon emissions resulting from the construction and the use of a building over its entire life, including its demolition and disposal. This guidance provides information on how to prepare an assessment of carbon emissions in order to fully capture a development’s carbon impact. 

The guidance applies to planning applications referred to the Mayor of London, however the assessment is encouraged for all major applications. The data provided by WLC assessments will inform future policy by showing where action can be taken to further reduce emissions. 

The guidance is aimed at planning applicants, developers, designers, energy consultants and local authority officers. It includes an assessment template which applicants will be expected to use. The guidance and the template can be viewed in the documents library. 

This page is a record of the engagement activities we undertook in developing the WLC Assessment guidance. It contains draft versions of the guidance and related documents. 

The draft guidance has been developed with technical expertise from Cundall and Targeting Zero and through engagement with a wide range of stakeholders, including developers and industry experts. 

The draft guidance was published for information in April 2020.  

We carried out engagement on the WLC Assessment guidance and received a range of helpful feedback. This has informed the final version of the guidance, which has now been published. 

The Mayor formally adopted the guidance in March 2022.