ZFA’s SE 2050 Commitment

ZFA has made the commitment to join the SE 2050 Challenge!

Sustainable design is an important part of ZFA’s philosophy and practices. We support continued efforts toward reducing embodied carbon in the built environment, achieving net zero energy in our designs, and staying educated on emerging technologies. In turn, we have pledged our commitment to the SE 2050 Commitment Program in an effort to help reduce embodied carbon in the design of structural systems.

What is behind the SE 2050 Challenge? In December 2019, the Board of Governors of the Structural Engineering Institute (SEI) of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) endorsed the vision for SE 2050, recognizing “the need for coordinated action across our profession to achieve the globally stated goal of net zero carbon by 2050.” The mission is to transform the practice of structural engineering in a way that is holistic, firm-wide, project-based, and data-driven. By prioritizing the reduction of embodied carbon, using less and/or less impactful structural materials, participating firms can more easily work toward the goal of net zero embodied carbon structural systems by the year 2050.

At ZFA, we believe that committing to the SE 2050 Challenge is a critical step in becoming stewards of the environment. We are taking the following actions companywide as part of our pledge:

    • We commit to reporting an Embodied Carbon Action Plan (ECAP) annually and permit the ECAP to be made public on the SE 2050 website.
    • We commit to submitting data to the SE 2050 project database annually in a collaborative effort to understand embodied carbon in structural engineering projects and to set attainable targets for future projects.

Staff at ZFA have eagerly stepped into serving as our firm’s leaders of the SE 2050 Commitment Program. Together they will guide our internal and external trainings, strategies, and communication for our ongoing commitment. We understand that the SE 2050 Commitment Program goals cannot be achieved alone—we invite firms to collaborate with our team and meet the SE 2050 Challenge together!