The events of the last two years have brought unprecedented transformation to the construction industry. The covid pandemic forced immediate changes, including a rapid shift to working from home and site closures, and is now having a longer-term impact. Companies are evaluating how they will balance home and office working, which affects demand for office space – with consequential impacts on town and city centres. Many people are re-evaluating their home and work priorities, driving a desire for more space, which is affecting established markets such as city-centre apartments. The rapid recovery from the hiatus caused by the pandemic has caused materials and labour shortages, leading to increased costs. Brexit has had an impact too because many European workers have gone home and not returned. The introduction of full custom controls on the movement of goods between the UK and EU in January 2022 could further lengthen lead times. And the introduction of the UKCA product mark in January 2023 could cause disruption to the manufacturing sector because of the costs and limited testing facilities needed for the new certification.

Net zero targets, which are being enthusiastically embraced by the development community, are focusing minds on the environmental impacts of construction – including, for the first time, embodied carbon. Whole-life carbon assessments, which evaluate the upfront, operational and end-of-life carbon impacts, are increasingly being requested by clients and are now a planning requirement on larger schemes in London. In turn, designers are asking manufacturers for environmental product declarations (EPDs) and factoring the environmental impacts of product manufacture into their specification choices.

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