Substantial reductions in façade embodied carbon are already achievable at scale, using existing industrial solutions. This is the clear message that emerged at the Carbon Experts Summit London on November 25, 2025.
During her session "Decarbonising aluminium at a global scale", Lucile Souyri, Sustainability Manager at Hydro Building Systems, focused on what is already being delivered across TECHNAL — Hydro’s architectural aluminium brand in the UK — through live product ranges, renovation projects, and life cycle assessed system design.
The implications for the built environment are significant. As embodied carbon increasingly dominates whole-life emissions, particularly in highly efficient buildings, the façade is no longer a secondary specification decision. It is becoming a primary climate lever, one that manufacturers, designers, and asset owners can act on today.
“If we want to decarbonise the building and construction sector, we need to stop looking only at operational energy and start working systematically on materials, renovation, and circularity,” said Lucile Souyri, Sustainability Manager at Hydro.
This intervention arrives at a critical moment for the construction sector. According to the WGBC, buildings account for approximately 39% of global energy-related CO₂ emissions, driven by both operational energy use and the embodied carbon of materials. While regulatory focus has historically centred on operational performance, the emissions profile of buildings is shifting rapidly as grids decarbonise and material impacts become more visible.
Façade systems sit directly at this intersection. They are material-intensive, technically complex, and replaced multiple times across a building’s lifespan, particularly in renovation-led decarbonisation pathways.
The scale of the challenge is reinforced by material flows. Construction generates around one third of total waste in Europe, yet a large share of this material is not reused in high-value applications, instead being landfilled, incinerated, or downcycled. Despite aluminium’s theoretical recyclability, façade systems have traditionally followed this linear model.
Around 75% of the buildings expected to be in use in 2050 already exist, placing selective deconstruction, material recovery, and high-performance renovation at the centre of carbon reduction efforts.
In aluminium façade systems, the metal itself represents the largest share of embodied carbon by mass. TECHNAL therefore began its decarbonisation strategy in 2018 by addressing aluminium sourcing directly.
Publicly available data from Hydro confirms the scale of the opportunity:
These figures represent reductions of approximately 80–95% compared with conventional primary aluminium supply. Today, Hydro CIRCAL® 75R is used as standard across TECHNAL product ranges, with 100R specified where project conditions allow.
Though critical, focusing on aluminium alone only addresses part of the embodied carbon profile. One of the most instructive aspects of TECHNAL’s approach is its system-level perspective.
Across its product portfolio, TECHNAL systems incorporate hundreds of individual components, each contributing differently to embodied carbon depending on mass and material intensity. Life cycle assessment modelling carried out internally identified a consistent pattern: recycled content delivers the lowest carbon option across materials, not just metals.
All new TECHNAL products now use end-of-life recycled aluminium and recycled polyamide as standard, with ongoing supplier engagement extending this approach to gaskets, glazing, and hardware.
The cumulative effect of material optimisation, process optimisation (including extrusion and surface treatment), and product optimisation — reducing material quantities — is most evident at system level.
According to TECHNAL’s internal life cycle assessments, a double-glazed aluminium façade system achieves:
These figures illustrate a reduction of approximately 50% in façade embodied carbon for certain projects and specifications, without compromising thermal, acoustic, or structural performance.
Material efficiency alone is insufficient if products are lost at end-of-life. TECHNAL has implemented a closed-loop approach for aluminium building systems, particularly focused on renovation projects.
The process includes selective deconstruction of existing façades, separation of aluminium, glass, polyamide and EPDM, and reintegration of recycled aluminium back into new façade systems within Hydro’s vertically integrated value chain. Partner networks address glass and polymer recycling, reducing downcycling and preserving material quality.
This approach reframes the city as a material bank, enabling façade-to-façade recycling rather than façade-to-scrap.
Embodied carbon reductions are matched by operational performance. TECHNAL systems are designed for high thermal and acoustic efficiency, supporting reduced energy demand across the building lifecycle.
Durability is equally critical. Aluminium systems are engineered for service lives of 40–60 years with minimal maintenance. To support this, TECHNAL has introduced Genius ID, a QR-based traceability system embedded within profiles, providing access to material composition, carbon data, maintenance guidance, and spare-parts information. This system enables repair over replacement and supports long-term asset stewardship.
A persistent barrier to low-carbon specification is the assumption that it carries a financial penalty. However, Lucile Souyri noted — drawing on internal analysis and external research — that high-performance, circular buildings can deliver around 5% higher rental income, 4% higher occupancy, 16–25% increases in asset value, and lower operating costs. Access to green finance and sustainability-linked funding further strengthens the commercial case.
In this context, carbon performance becomes a driver of asset value, not a constraint.
“Sustainability and circularity do not only reduce environmental impacts. They also bring value to buildings — through higher performance, lower operating costs, and stronger long-term asset value,” as Lucile Souyri states.
A key enabler of this approach is digital product life cycle assessment. By integrating One Click LCA into TECHNAL’s design workflows, architects and façade engineers can compare design options, quantify embodied carbon impacts, and generate product-specific LCAs and EPDs at an early design stage — when design decisions have the greatest influence on carbon outcomes.
“Working with One Click LCA makes it much easier for us to identify where the real carbon hotspots are, compare material alternatives, and choose recycled content where it has the greatest impact. It allows us to prioritise decisions based on data, not assumptions.” — Lucile Souyri, Sustainability Manager at Hydro
Decarbonising the construction sector at scale requires a set of structural shifts that go beyond individual products or projects. These include a move from primary extraction to urban mining, from established practice to innovation, from inefficient existing stock to high-performance buildings, and from static blueprints to digital, data-driven design.
TECHNAL’s aluminium façade strategy shows how these shifts can be translated into practical action. By aligning material science, circular system design, and digital life cycle assessment, substantial reductions in façade embodied carbon are no longer theoretical targets. They are outcomes that can already be delivered in today’s building and renovation projects.
Embodied carbon in aluminium façades refers to the greenhouse gas emissions associated with producing, processing, transporting, installing, and disposing of aluminium façade systems. According to One Click LCA methodology, this includes emissions from aluminium production, fabrication, and end-of-life treatment, making façade material choices a major driver of whole-life building carbon.
Aluminium façades are material-intensive systems and often represent a significant share of a building’s upfront embodied carbon. As operational emissions fall, One Click LCA assessments increasingly show that envelope systems dominate lifecycle impacts, particularly in renovation projects where façades are replaced multiple times.
Primary aluminium used in construction typically has a carbon footprint of around 10 kg CO₂e/kg of aluminium, depending on energy source and production route. Hydro highlights that this high intensity makes aluminium a priority material for decarbonisation through recycled content and low-carbon supply chains.
Using post-consumer recycled aluminium can reduce embodied carbon by approximately 80–95% compared with primary aluminium. Hydro’s Hydro CIRCAL® 75R has a verified footprint of around 1.9 kg CO₂e/kg, while Hydro CIRCAL® 100R achieves below 0.5 kg CO₂e/kg, as verified through life cycle assessment.
Circular renovation means selectively deconstructing existing aluminium façades so materials can be recovered and recycled into new façade systems. Hydro applies this approach through closed-loop aluminium recycling, while One Click LCA enables designers to quantify the carbon benefits of façade-to-façade material recovery at project level.
Yes. Hydro and its architectural brand TECHNAL already deliver aluminium façade systems using high levels of recycled aluminium. Using One Click LCA to assess system-level impacts, these façades have demonstrated around 50% lower embodied carbon per square metre compared with conventional market-average façade systems.