Sustainable Building Envelope Centre

Buildings account for around 40% of all CO2 emissions and any carbon reduction strategy has to address this in order to deliver real change.

Funded by Tata Steel, the Low Carbon Research Institute(LCRI) and Welsh Assembly Government, SBEC’s focus is on accelerating the development of low and zero carbon solutions for the built environment using steel in combination with other materials.  This will involve working closely with other Welsh technology companies and developing supply chains for the installation and maintenance of any solutions that emerge.

SBEC’s aim is to create a construction process which will enable the façade of buildings - both roof and walls - to be transformed from a passive energy conservation role to an active energy generation, storage, dissipation and management function

Based at Tata Steel’s Shotton site in North Wales and led by the LCRI, SBEC operates out of a specially refurbished building designed to act as a test rig and proving ground for new technologies, demonstrating them in use. The building has provisionally been awarded a BREEAM Excellent rating.