Hey Reader,

Over the past months you may have noticed something new appearing in sustainability reports, websites and tenders: nature and biodiversity.

It’s like in the early 2010s with carbon emissions. Companies started announcing targets that back then no one could differentiate. Carbon neutrality, CO2-neutral, net zero….It was a bit of a wild west.

Nature and biodiversity seem to be entering a similar phase.

Banks are starting to ask questions. Complex frameworks are coming up. Definitions seem not to be clear for most.

Organisations are trying to figure out what this topic actually means for their business.

I wouldn’t call it a hype, rather the beginning of a learning curve.

Heijmans has clearly passed the first exploration phase and has a clear idea.

Also I spent a lot of time learning over the past year. I spent eight days in a community of practice organised by the WWF and The Shift. It’s called The Biodiversity Shift.

Companies from different sectors came together to understand how their activities interact with nature and how to get better.

Let me make your life easier by sharing a few insights so that you have to look up everything yourself.

But before we talk about impacts, we need to clarify something: nature is not the same as biodiversity.

What “nature” actually means

Nature is not just biodiversity.

Nature includes the living AND non-living parts of ecosystems:

soil
water
air
living species

A simple way to think about it:

Nature = the system

Biodiversity = the living component of that system

Construction interacts with the entire system.

It affects soils through land sealing (new buildings, roads,…).

Water through dewatering of constructing pits.

Air through emissions and dust.

And biodiversity through habitat destruction and fragmentation.

An AI image I created a while ago titled "No shit, Sherlock"

It’s tempting to focus on visible elements. In my opinion, this is what happens currently in construction the most.

An insect hotel “to boost biodiversity”.
A protected frog species “delaying a permit”.

But the real impacts is in the value chain for which you have to zoom out.

Where do the materials we use actually come from?

How are they extracted?

Once you start asking those questions, the scale of the issue becomes much clearer.

And bigger.

Direct impacts on nature

Let’s start with what happens on the construction site itself.

Construction directly affects nature through:

soil sealing and land use change
emissions and dust
noise disturbance
groundwater extraction and dewatering
climate emissions

You heard of all of this before. Probably linked to environmental permits and climate strategies.

But actually: these are all impacts on nature. Which makes it interesting to finally break out of silo’s of departments and have one focused approach.

One example that rarely gets attention is water.

Most buildings today are relatively efficient in water use.

Offices designed according to BREEAM or similar standards often use little water during operation.

So the initial reaction is to assume construction does not really have a water issue.

That perspective is too narrow.

Have you already heard of water stress, Reader?

Water stress measures how much pressure human activities place on local water resources. Surprisingly, parts of Europe score very high on this metric.

Flanders, the northern region of Belgium is one of them.

For real, despite all the rain.

Globally, Belgium is in the “Top” 25 countries of water stress. Scoring higher than Mexico, Spain or Algeria.

Screenshot of "Aqueduct water risk atlas"

Belgium has:

high population density
little natural water storage
groundwater flowing to the sea
high withdrawal relative to supply

In Flanders alone, about 60 million cubic meters of groundwater are withdrawn each year for construction pit dewatering.

Around 90 percent of that water is discharged into the sewer system.

Once it enters the sewer network, it is effectively lost from the local groundwater system.

This makes it even more important to take best efforts in projects to re-infiltrate the pumped water.

Indirect impacts in the value chain

The bigger story lies outside the construction site.

Most biodiversity impacts of construction happen in the supply chain.

Think about the materials we use every day:

Concrete requires sand, gravel and limestone extracted from quarries or riverbeds.
Steel requires iron ore mining and large amounts of energy.
Aluminum production is both mining- and energy-intensive.
Timber comes from forests that must be managed carefully

All of these materials originate from natural systems.

And their extraction can affect ecosystems in different ways:

destruction of habitats
disturbance of wildlife
fragmentation of ecosystems
pressure on land and water resources

Construction is therefore deeply impacting AND dependent on nature.

The sector only exists because ecosystems provide the resources we build with.

Who actually cares about nature?

Beyond the environmental argument, there are several practical reasons why companies in construction should start paying attention.

First, banks are increasingly looking at nature-related risks.

Financial institutions are beginning to ask how companies interact with ecosystems and whether they understand their dependencies on natural resources.

Some banks are already exploring nature-related lending frameworks.

Second, permits.

Anyone working in construction in the Netherlands knows how disruptive environmental constraints can become.

Nitrogen emissions affecting protected habitats have stalled thousands of projects.

Environmental impacts on nature increasingly determine whether projects can happen.

Third, risk and resilience.

Reducing pressure on ecosystems often means reducing reliance on virgin raw materials.

And that leads directly to strategies the construction sector already understands:

circular materials
recycled aggregates
reuse of building components
bio-based materials sourced responsibly

You when I write that circularity is important for construction.

Circularity and biodiversity are often discussed separately.

In reality they are closely connected.

Reducing extraction pressure reduces ecosystem pressure.

So how could a nature strategy look like?

One important insight from the biodiversity community of practice was that serious nature strategies follow a clear hierarchy.

The goal is not simply to compensate for damage.

Here is a high-level approach to nature in construction.

1. Avoid impacts

The most effective biodiversity action is avoiding damage in the first place.

This means prioritising brownfield redevelopment, limiting development in ecologically sensitive areas, and protecting existing soils, habitats and water systems during planning.

2. Reduce unavoidable impacts

When impacts cannot be avoided, they should be minimised.

This includes limiting soil sealing (build in height!), reducing pollution, protecting trees and habitats during construction. Designing projects that maintain water infiltration and ecological connectivity.

3. Restore ecosystems locally

Projects can help restore ecological functions, but that takes serious efforts.

This may involve planting native vegetation, restoring waterways, improving soil health, or creating habitats through green roofs and wetlands.

The UK uses an interesting framework of “Biodiversity Net Gain” to make claims concrete.

4. Reduce value chain pressures

A large share of construction’s impact occurs in the supply chain.

Reducing these pressures means using circular materials, lowering demand for virgin aggregates, and sourcing responsibly produced bio-based materials.

5. Contribute to landscape restoration

Finally, companies can support ecosystem recovery beyond individual projects.

This can involve restoring wetlands, supporting biodiversity initiatives or collaborating with local authorities and NGOs on landscape-scale restoration.

Don’t start with this. Start from the beginning.

Me figuring out nature at "The Biodiversity Shift"

A final thought

Construction only exists because ecosystems function.

Don’t treat nature and biodiversity as the enemy in your developments but as an opportunity.

Being aware of your impacts and having a first idea how to approach a nature strategy will only help you in the long run. Then you can start developments and permits with an existing playbook.

And once you step outside the carbon tunnel vision, it becomes clear that understanding our relationship with nature is the next big challenge for the built environment.