Embodied vs Operational Carbon Emissions

Abstract

This paper introduces the topic of embodied and operational carbon, as well as the relationship between the two. Furthermore, this paper challenges the idea that as operational carbon emissions decrease in the share of total carbon due to technologies, this will increase the ratio of embodied carbon emissions. Instead, this paper demonstrates that either technology existing to lower operational carbon emissions will also decrease the embodied carbon emissions as the side effect, or other technologies are available to lower embodied carbon emissions. In the end, this paper advocates for the total carbon approach in which both embodied and operational carbon are targeted when lowering carbon emissions.