As temperatures rise, buildings will face increasing pressure to fulfill their core purpose: protecting occupants from extreme outdoor conditions. This change will impact the design of buildings and their surroundings, influence material selection for building envelopes, and increase the adoption of cooling systems.

About one-fourth of global CO2 emissions stem from building operations. Achieving net-zero by 2050 requires further decarbonizing fuels used by buildings and reducing energy intensity through optimization of how thermal energy is generated, recovered, stored, and consumed.

Almost 10% of CO2 emitted globally stems from building construction, maintenance, renovation, and deconstruction. Achieving net-zero requires cutting not only operational but also embodied emissions by using less new or reused material, shifting to bio-based materials, and improving conventional building materials.

Governments are shifting from voluntary commitments under the Paris Agreement to binding energy codes targeting building CO2 emissions. While building codes to reduce operational emissions will tighten globally, regulations will also expand to address embodied carbon to provide transparent lifecycle data on construction materials.

The complex landscape of sustainability reporting poses harmonization challenges, but ESG reporting drives efficiency, reduces risks, and meets growing investor and customer expectations. Reliable aggregation of granular data will be key for reporting compliance and resource optimization.

The construction industry faces a significant skilled labor shortage, amplified by a retiring workforce — an issue even more acute in the HVAC sector. To address this, the construction industry will invest in its image, scale training of skilled-trades talent, and leverage technology.

Buildings form the backbone of modern life, providing stable environments for living, working, and recreation. However, four critical factors — extreme weather events, urbanization, cyber threats, and emerging building technologies — underscore the pressing need to enhance building safety to better protect occupants.

People spend nearly 90% of their time indoors, with rising post-pandemic awareness for healthy indoor spaces, a need further accelerated by air pollution and growing investor and tenant expectations. This will shape the design of new buildings and retrofits to prioritize occupant well-being, focusing more on thermal comfort, air quality, acoustic comfort, and optimal lighting.

The pandemic has swiftly transformed daily life by emptying offices and malls and turning homes into workplaces. This will leave a lasting impact, changing a long-standing paradigm, where spaces are no longer fixed in form and function, but dynamic to meet evolving demands.

The number of IoT-enabled devices in buildings is rapidly increasing, but several challenges, such as limited interoperability and scalability, lack of upgradability, and data overload, still prevent their full potential from unfolding. IP-based communication protocols, semantic domain models, and secure over-the-network updates will help overcome those hurdles and unlock new use cases.

Global construction labor productivity lags other industries due to fragmented planning, execution and operation, limited data exchange, and outdated progress monitoring methods. Innovative approaches such as integrated project delivery, advanced digital planning, and digital workflow management will help to streamline project execution, reducing costly rework and project delays.

The global building automation control systems (BACS) market is growing rapidly, but current systems struggle with fragmented operations and inefficiencies. Next-generation BACS will combine deeper integration with decentralized intelligence, flatter architectures, and AI-driven capabilities to enhance energy efficiency, occupant comfort, and operational resilience.