LMC Meets - The #ChooseToChallenge series, Susan Hone-Brookes

Susan is Vice Present of CIBSE and just took up the role of Director of Sustainability at independent design consultancy chapmanbdsp.

Her first focus area when she joined the business was to create a vision and mission statement for champanbdsp and most importantly to update their environmental charter, which will be presented to the industry today – just in time for Earth Day 2021.

Watch the video to hear the full story.

With COP26 just round the corner, Susan spoke about the pivotal role played by engineering professionals in the push for net zero carbon. As innovators with a solid technical understanding, engineers are at the frontline in the effort to reduce carbon footprint in the built environment, and this needs to be progressively acknowledged.

“We have to show our understanding, our flexibility and willingness to be pioneers, as we have been in the past, to achieve this transition.” said Susan.

In support of this year’s campaign by International Women’s day, we asked Susan what she would be committing to, to drive some positive change. “The statistics show that in the next number of years there will be 720 million people in extreme poverty due to climate change if we do not act.” explained Susan, as she spoke about the need for both individuals and organisations to challenge themselves to make all the needed changes to lower their impact on the environment.

In this regard, chapmanbdsp will commit to science based targets as well as aligning to the 17 UN Sustainability Goals, ensuring that as a business they can keep developing successful designs while reducing the impact on the environment.