We need to stop our collective carbon-loading of the atmosphere, but that need is often met by objections like “my emissions are small so they’re okay” or “what about China and India?” Classic free-rider justification.

In The New Carbon Architecture, Bruce King and his merry band of authors unpack all of the ways in which we can eliminate embodied carbon emissions when constructing buildings, and even go beyond to construct carbon negative buildings.

By burning fossil fuels these last couple hundred years, we’ve been borrowing against our carbon budget and our climate future. Trillions of tons of carbon have been spent into the atmosphere, and we now need to pay them back by returning them to the earth.

As this bucket fills, it shows humanity “using up” its carbon budget. Most striking is how fast the rate of change has accelerated in the last few decades.