Hey Reader,

When I read:

“Amazon builds first certified zero-carbon building in Europe.”

All my alarm bells went off.

I don’t doubt their capacity or ambitions.

But “zero-carbon building” is one of the most misleading phrases in our industry.

Just last Sunday I shared a podcast where Amazon’s climate neutralization lead explained how they approach carbon credits.

A few days later, they announced a new delivery station in the UK.

Certified Zero Carbon.

Of course I had to dive in.

Quick disclaimer before we're starting:

I don’t have an Amazon account. And I don’t plan to get one.

I’m not a fan of their growth logic. So this is absolutely no advertisement. Simply curiosity.

Even if I don’t agree with everything a company is doing, I can still give them credits for the good steps they are taking.

The Scale Factor

Amazon operates thousands of buildings:

• Fulfillment centers
• Offices
• Data centers
• Retail

If they shift how they build, this has an impact on the complete supply-chain.

What stands out for me: Amazon goes much further than only purchasing lower-carbon materials.

Through their $2 billion Climate Pledge Fund, Amazon invests in material innovators and then uses those technologies in their own projects.

In their portfolio:

• Electra – low-carbon iron for steel
• Brimstone – alternative cement chemistry
• CarbonCure – CO₂ mineralised into concrete
• Paebbl – CO₂ turned into solid building material

Amazon also joined the Sustainable Concrete Buyers Alliance.

It’s a coalition of major developers and tech companies committing to buy lower-carbon concrete at scale. Prologis and Meta are members, too.

If buyers representing millions of square meters demand low-carbon mixes, suppliers will have to respond.

Case 1 — Sacramento, California

This fulfillment center became the first building to receive Living Future’s Zero Carbon Certification.

From a Western European perspective, the energy initiatives seem not to be rocket-science. For the US it might be ambitious, I can’t judge.

No fossil heating, renewable electricity use, solar panels, white roofs.

Where it gets more interesting:

• Lower-carbon concrete with recycled granulates
• Plywood used as roof decking

Compared to the regular steel deck, using plywood realized a reduction of 49%.

I stopped reading for a sec at this sentence:

Translated:

Remaining emissions are offset.

The Certification Framework – Living Future’s Zero Carbon

So what is this certification exactly they are going for?

To achieve it, projects must:

• Use 100% renewable energy
• Prove performance over 12 months (measured, not modelled)
• Conduct a full embodied carbon LCA (A1–A5 upfront emissions)
• Offset 100% of remaining emissions

That last part is where it gets difficult for me.

The framework does include an embodied carbon threshold goal:

350 kg CO₂e per m² (A1–A5).

It’s framed as a target / threshold goal, not a strict maximum.

If a project exceeds it, teams must explain why and show that they tried to reduce emissions.

But they can still certify. Offsetting is officially described as a “last resort.”

My biggest problem with it:

A project at 180 kg CO₂/m²

and one at 400 kg CO₂/m²

can both become “zero” through compensation.

It’s not greenwashing but I also don’t think that this framework will fly in Europe.

Not because we are morally superior but the term “carbon neutral” is almost not used anymore. Mostly because of the touchy debates around offsets.

And there are already more than enough frameworks (BREEAM, WELL, DGNB, GRO, Paris Proof,….) that are much more established with owners and investors.

Case 2 — Elkhart, Indiana (2025)

I came across this one already when researching my previous newsletter on decarbonization of logistic buildings.

In my opinion, it's really exciting!

Finished October 2025.

It’s positioned as a their sustainability testing ground. They tested roughly 40 sustainability initiatives.

Low-carbon concrete is used for the floor plate.

Timber is everywhere:

• Beams and columns are a mix of mass timber and low-carbon steel.
• Walls are made of timber elements
• Wood fiber insulation

Just like in Sacramento, the roof decking is made from timber. Cool approach, that seems to be widely spread in the US.

This measure seems something that is not to be copy-pasted in Europe. I have never seen something like this here. Have you Reader?

Unfortunately they did not include any embodied carbon per m² figures.

With the measures taken, I guess that it’s pretty low. Probably around 150-180 kg CO2/m².

Case 3 — Stockton-on-Tees (UK)

10,800 m² delivery station, currently under construction in the north of the UK.

Amazon’s first European building going for the Living Future Zero Carbon.

Material strategy:

• High recycled-content steel produced with renewable electricity
• Mass timber beams
• Lower-carbon concrete
• Cement-free paving storing captured carbon
• Carbon-storing concrete materials embedding CO₂

On a picture from the construction progress it seems that they mostly rely on steel, less timber.

For some of these materials, they will probably use the companies they are backing with the Climate Pledge Fund.

They expect emissions to be at least 20% lower than their previous standard. But also this time no published carbon emissions.

So what?

Amazon is serious about decarbonising its buildings.

They pilot materials.

They invest in startups that help them reaching their climate goals They use procurement power at scale.

That’s more than most developers do.

What I struggle with is the framework.

They are not publishing embodied carbon per m² figures. And under the Zero Carbon certification, a building can still be certified “zero” even if its upfront emissions are high as long as they are offset.

Amazon is clearly pushing the industry forward.

It’s just a pity that the framework they chose makes their efforts look weaker than they actually are.

Tip of the week

The TEDx talk by Joost Delercq, an architect from Archipelago, talking about sufficiency in construction as solution to climate change.

I’ve known Joost for quite a while and I always enjoyed the discussions with him. He has been really pushing the sufficiency concept for a while.

I’m really happy to see him on the cool stage like this. Guarded by dinosaurs.

It’s a 10-minute video in Flemish but I already checked the automatically translated subtitle of YouTube. It works really well, so don’t be held back.

He talks, amongst others, about even though we have invested in the previous decades a lot in energy efficiency, we actually didn’t really save any energy. We became sloppy and careless in energy use.

Sufficiency is the question: what do we really need?

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