DuPont's Shawn Hunter tells Sara Gutterman why builders are redesigning building envelopes around continuous insulation to meet new energy codes and standards, and how environmental product declarations are helping the industry measure and reduce embodied carbon — including a 94% embodied carbon reduction DuPont achieved in its Styrofoam brand XPS insulation. He also discusses ESG risk management and the carbon modeling planned for the Vision House Las Vegas project with Beazer Homes.
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Sara Gutterman: The housing industry is experiencing rapid transformation. What changes are you seeing and what are you most excited about.
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Shawn Hunter: As a provider of energy efficiency and whether they should? I think we get pretty excited when we see these transformative actions that are driving energy efficiency in the housing industry. So we're really excited to see the move towards continuous insulation that's really being adopted by builders as really the best solution to meet the new codes and standards. So things like, you know, whether it's 21 Iirc, code or Energy Star 3.2, you know, we are seeing builders actually redesigning the building envelopes to adopt continuous insulation.
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Shawn Hunter: And synapses become a regular topic in the market these days. So that's been pretty exciting. Of course, you know, very relevant to decarbonization and managing our operational carbon. But I think if you look across the entire carbon spectrum and you focus also on the embodied carbon side. One thing that's just really moving really quickly is the conversation on environmental product declarations.
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Shawn Hunter: So our EP's and we've just seen really over the last six months, a year, just more and more builders asking about our which again, is really exciting to see because it's really how we tackle that embodied carbon side of the equation.
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Sara Gutterman: Tell us a little bit about the products that DuPont offers with EP's.
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Shawn Hunter: First, I'd kind of start by saying that I think we're seeing folks looking at EDS for maybe a few different reasons. You know, some are starting the journey just to kind of understand what's out there. Some are actually starting to measure the embodied carbon of their builds, which is kind of the next step. And then others are even starting to manage and maybe set targets about how do we drive down the embodied carbon of our builds.
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Shawn Hunter: So as you mentioned, we've been able to meet that demand for EDS. We've actually been providing EDS on our products for about a decade now. But it's something that, you know, we know we need to continue doing, especially when it comes to something like product innovation. So, for example, you know, we did recently innovate to reduce the embodied carbon of our styrofoam brand XPS insulation product.
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Shawn Hunter: And, you know, we achieved a pretty impressive 94% reduction in embodied carbon through that innovation. And so naturally, you know, we're communicating this progress through our. So we're sort of using it to provide our customers in that case both of the carbon for the new product, but also with a comparison versus the previous product. So you can kind of really see what that that impressive 94% reduction means.
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Sara Gutterman: Can you talk a little bit about how DuPont is addressing resiliency, both in terms of your products but also transformative.
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Shawn Hunter: But from a business resiliency perspective, you're speaking directly to sort of the overall ESG risk management perspective. And you know, that that idea in terms of how do you essentially future proof your business is what I think motivate motivates the entire, you know, business engagement in ESG because you know, that things are changing. You know that there are likely risks that you may not have planned for.
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Shawn Hunter: And so you really need to be looking around the corner at that. And I think that that future looking is see sort of mindset just helps get you there. So, you know, we're we're doing a lot of work in that area. Definitely it continues to evolve and even the state of the art, the best practice continues to evolve in terms of, you know, what scenarios do you look at?
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Shawn Hunter: How do you translate those scenarios into like specific risks or even opportunities, right, based on where your strategy is going? And I'd say, you know, we are we're definitely in the earlier stages as far as, you know, being, you know, just being the experts in that space. But we know we need to keep looking because again, undeniably, there are those risks that are coming that we need to recognize as a business and plan.
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Sara Gutterman: For now, let's shift gears and talk about the vision House Las Vegas project that we are collectively doing with Beazer Homes. We're very excited about this project because through the project, Beazer is really showcasing that they are raising the bar on their competitive set of production builders by committing to build all zero energy ready homes by 2025 throughout all of their national portfolio of homes.
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Sara Gutterman: So how do you think that a project like the vision House Las Vegas helps the housing sector across the Rubicon, so to speak, with respect to the sustainability.
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Shawn Hunter: In terms of the Crossing the Rubicon theme, which I love, you know, it's about the die being cast and, you know, there's no going back, right? And I think that when it comes to just carbon overall as an area to be measured and managed, there's no going back on that. I think at some point in the not too distant future, carbon is really going to become a common language for everybody in the value chain.
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Shawn Hunter: And so that's really exciting. But I think, you know, specific to this project is specific to the vision House Las Vegas project is the carbon modeling that's going to be done with the project. So in the project, right, there are plans for a detailed accounting of the carbon footprint of the builds. And that's just really exciting because it gives us a sense of what does it look like to achieve a net carbon or a net zero carbon for the building.
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Shawn Hunter: And, you know, using, I'm sure, a really good LCA work and EDS and all those things. But for me, that's that's a really exciting area, just to see how in this project, the carbon modeling aspect comes together. I think when we think about that space, there's really a lot that we can all learn about decarbonizing the overall housing sector.
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Shawn Hunter: And, you know, through the learnings that will have in this project, I think, as we like to say in DuPont, it's really going to help us learn what we need to do in order to build and innovate as if our future depends on it, because we know that it does.