What We Are
In light of global concerns regarding climate change, Carbon Storm fills a
unique niche: our software calculates carbon footprints of landscapes and
hardscapes. Carbon Storm accounts for the four principal avenues of
carbon emission or sequestration: embodied material emission,
construction emission, maintenance emission, and vegetative
sequestration. The model allows you to input detailed design information,
making it unique in this space. Use our model to optimize landscape plans
(including stormwater design) to reduce your carbon footprint or calculate
how much carbon can be sequestered by simply adjusting maintenance
regimens.
Our model follows the general requirements and guidance for life cycle
assessment and carbon footprint accounting put forth by the International
Organization for Standardization (ISO 104044:2006 and ISO 14067:2018,
respectively). Our carbon accounting framework has also undergone
academic peer review ( Moore and Hunt, 2013 )
How we do it
Software Model Description
The Carbon Storm model is a tool that enables users to estimate the carbon emissions associated with the construction and maintenance of managed landscapes. Embodied carbon of construction materials, as well as sequestration by the various types of vegetation that users may specify within the landscape, are also accounted for. Intended users include municipalities, government organizations, large corporations and development firms, or any other entity that wishes to quantify and/or optimize its carbon emissions. Within the model, users can specify any combination of landcover types typical of developed landscapes, including pavement (asphalt or concrete), grass (including highly managed turf grass or non-irrigated native grasses), trees and shrubs. Users may also choose from among 11 stormwater control measures (SCMs), including both common conveyances (reinforced concrete pipe, concrete-lined channels, and grassed swales) and water quality/quantity control structures (bioretention, sand filters, constructed ponds and wetlands,level spreader-vegetated filter strips, vegetated roofs, permeable pavements, planter bed tree boxes, and rainwater cisterns). Inclusion of SCMs makes this model ideal for municipalities or other entities with stormwater quality and quantity permitting requirements. SCMs are not included in any other carbon footprint calculator currently available even though these engineered systems can account for a substantial portion of the overall landscape carbon footprint.
For each landscape type, users may specify details associated with the design (including dimensions, types of construction materials, and types of vegetation), construction (for example, types of equipment used and distance over which materials are sourced), and maintenance (including frequency of maintenance events, the distance maintenance crews must travel and types of equipment used) or use default values that have been built into the model based on typical construction and maintenance practices. Based on these inputs, the quantity of various construction materials and their associated embodied carbon is calculated by the model, along with predicted carbon emissions arising from construction and maintenance activities. Carbon sequestration, which is counted as an offset to carbon embodied in materials and emitted through construction and maintenance, is calculated automatically based on the type and areal extent of vegetation specified by the user.
As an output, the model produces tables and charts in which each component of the carbon footprint (i.e., embodied carbon, construction and maintenance emissions) are quantified along with vegetative sequestration. If a target carbon footprint is desired, the user is able to go back and edit inputs to analyze different scenarios, ranging in scale from the design of single SCM (for example, increasing the vegetative cover in a bioretention cell) to the overall development scale (for example, reducing street width and enlarging grass swales to reduce the use of more carbon-intense reinforced concrete conveyance structures) for the purpose of minimizing or optimizing the landscape's carbon footprint.
More Information
Contact us
Contact: Leshan Fernando
Email: lfernando@carbonstorm.com
Phone: 919-740-3238
