Carbon Designer 3D

Early, fast, & easy LCAs without BIM

Carbon Designer 3D enables you to reduce embodied carbon early in the design process with instant material insights. Get accurate LCAs using just building type and size.

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Modify structures & materials

Easily switch between frames and structure types.
Access One Click LCA’s extensive database for materials.
Add or replace materials and assemblies to explore multiple design options.

Save & manage unlimited designs

Project-based structure allows for flexible saving and organizing.
Revisit and manage your designs anytime for streamlined data handling.

Set baselines & templates

Designate any project as a reusable baseline template.
Make comparisons across projects or share templates with your team.
Create region-specific templates to meet local standards.
Customize templates for specific building parts or energy scenarios.

Compare designs easily & visualize hotspots

Identify material and structural hotspots.
Refine your design by adjusting elements and materials to find the most optimal option.
Compare up to four designs simultaneously.

Calculate carbon from building type & size

✔ Total carbon impact
✔ Carbon hotspots
✔ Total carbon reductions or increases

Compare design options visually

✔ By building parts
✔ By classification
✔ By material
✔ By component

Make data-driven design choices

✔ Build tall vs go small
✔ Structural material choice
✔ Build new vs refurbish
✔ Construction systems choice
✔ Supplier choice

“Carbon Designer 3D is amazing. We can look into options for reducing carbon very early in the design process, when we don’t even know what the material profile will look like.”

Judhajit (Jude) Chakraborty

Senior Sustainability Consultant

“One Click LCA's Carbon Designer 3D helped us create reference buildings for both options, allowing us to compare materials, carbon emissions, and costs. The software's database also enabled us to evaluate different energy systems. The results showed that rehabilitating the City Hall would generate less carbon emissions than replacing the building with a new one.”

Vegard Selvåg Ulvan

Head of LCA at Ramboll Norway

"In the sustainable building department, we provide LCA and carbon expertise across markets. We intervene from the design stage to the execution of the project, and we work on new construction and rehabilitation projects, depending on the environmental goal. This is why we choose One Click LCA as the motor to handle our carbon assessments."

Lissette Campoverde

LCA Built Environment Specialist at Aiguasol

“Why is early-stage carbon optioneering important? We've seen an increasing prevalence across all industry standards from operational carbon to embodied carbon, and that could follow through to the increasing cost to carbon offset. Optimizing early provides the biggest impact."

Holly Wheeler

Senior Environmental Consultant at Chapmanbdsp

Image Bergen Rådhus Bygg og Anlegg Media AS, Ole Harald Dale-1

Ramboll cuts carbon by 60% and extends Bergen City Hall's lifespan by 50 years

Learn how Ramboll achieved BREEAM 'Very Good' certification and reduced carbon emissions during the rehabilitation of Bergen City Hall.

Aiguasol drives sustainable building innovation with One Click LCA

How Aiguasol uses One Click LCA as a key decision-making tool for sustainable building design projects.

Maximizing value through early-stage carbon optioneering

Top takeaways to reduce carbon and costs from a leading environmental consultancy.

Carbon Designer 3D Guide

Discover how CD3D supports carbon reduction from day one.

Read the guide

Frequently asked questions

Learn more about Carbon Designer 3D

How can I get Carbon Designer 3D?

It’s part of the new One Click LCA Carbon Strategy and Expert Packs and selected other packs, and available as an add-on to other versions of One Click LCA’s software for buildings.

Where is Carbon Designer 3D available?

Carbon Designer 3D can be used anywhere in the world, for any building type and it supports nearly all of One Click LCA’s compliance modules, so it can be used for regulatory and certification needs. Localized versions of Carbon Designer 3D offer tailored typical building scenarios for the relevant area and currently include Ireland, Germany (using Okobau data) and Hungary, with more to come.

The template functionality allows users to add custom company templates in Carbon Designer 3D in order to create more customized scenarios for different regions or specific material types, building parts or construction practices.

Does Carbon Designer 3D work with all licence levels?

Any licence from Business and above can access Carbon Designer 3D as an add-on option. In some packages, this is included in the main plan, although the functionality available with Carbon Designer 3D may vary according to the licence level. Talk to our team to find out which option will work best for you.

Which LCA tools is Carbon Designer 3D compatible with?

It’s part of the new One Click LCA Carbon Strategy and Expert Packs and selected other packs, and available as an add-on to other versions of One Click LCA’s software for buildings. Carbon Designer 3D supports all of One Click LCA’s compliance modules for buildings with following exceptions: Dutch MPG/NMD, British IMPACT and Swiss Graue Energie modules. There is currently no infrastructure version of Carbon Designer 3D.

Can I use Carbon Designer 3D if I don't have any material quantities?

Absolutely, yes. The only things you need to know are building type, gross floor area, and the number of floors. For the rest, you can either customize or use default values. Carbon Designer will generate shoebox material quantities that would be translated into carbon impacts.

Is the 3D model a fully detailed representation of a building?

The model is an accurate representation of the building, showing e.g. the positioning of columns and beams. But it does not include certain building parts, such as stairs, balconies or windows. It is a simplified but accurate model.

Is Carbon Designer 3D only for use at the beginning of a project?

No. Carbon Designer 3D supports early carbon optimisation and screening LCAs at the earliest phases of a project. But it can also be used to speed up carbon assessments at later project stages.

Which structural systems can Carbon Designer 3D be used with?

Carbon Designer 3D can be used with a range of structural systems, including Precast beam-column structure without lateral beams, Cast-in place beam-column structures and more. The tool also makes it easy to change structural systems within your designs.

Who developed Carbon Designer 3D?

Carbon Designer 3D has been developed by One Click LCA. The precursor tool, Carbon Designer, was developed by One Click LCA Ltd originally with the Norwegian government in 2018 and it has been subsequently expanded with additional national building models with: Ireland (Irish GBC), France (FPI France), Finland (Confederation of Finnish construction industries) and numerous industry organisations.

What is the difference between the existing Carbon Designer tool and Carbon Designer 3D?

Carbon Designer and Carbon Designer 3D have the same core functionality, but the new version includes several improved features – many as a response to user feedback. Here is a summary of the main enhancements.

Improved structural calculations – therefore higher accuracy.
User experience improvements to speed up your workflow: User-friendly search.
Ability to add any material and structure from across One Click LCA’s extensive database, rather than just choosing from pre-listed ones.
Simplified design creation process.
Ability to switch between different structure types.
Ability to access the full details of every design you compare, including specific materials and composite elements.
Unlimited designs and ability to compare four at a time.
Baseline functionality improvements: Any design can be set as a baseline.
Ability to create and save custom reference templates and private data for use across your company in current and future projects.
Ability to create a reference building for a new region or country that does not yet have one.
Ability to limit templates to specific building parts or specific energy consumption scenarios – to focus on the areas you need.
You have the flexibility to change the baseline scenarios used for comparisons and can see the full details of every design to identify where the regional impacts are coming from and edit directly.
Advanced visualization
Having a 3D model helps users understand what the reference building looks like and to understand where impacts come from.
More visualizations – including graphs showing results by material, element, classification (eg RICS and others).
Project-based tool, rather than design-based. You can upload as many designs as you wish and have the flexibility to save and manage your data as you wish.

Ready to maximize carbon reductions?

Talk to our experts to see Carbon Designer 3D in action.

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