Spotlight: Will Scott
At the start of each quarter, we like to highlight the incredible work being undertaken by our team, showing off their talent and experience whilst also getting to know them a bit.
It’s now June, meaning it’s time to issue the third in our spotlight interview series. This month, we’re welcoming William!
William is our resident enthusiast on biodiversity and all things net zero - undertaking his PhD at UCL in Sustainability and the Built Environment, William always uses his wealth of academic knowledge to bring a fresh perspective to his work.
We are choosing to focus on this aspect of our work - under the Love Nature workstream, currently headed by William - due to the growing demand to reduce the impact of our lived environment on the natural world, integrating new developments seamlessly into the surrounding landscape. Read further below to learn more about William and our work within Love Nature here at Love Design Studio.
Hi Will let’s get started!
1. In the past year, has there been a book or album or film that has really spoken to you? If so, could you explain why you would recommend this to our readership?
I saw Cymande in Shepherd’s Bush earlier this year and they were epic! Bearing in mind these guys are in their seventies now and still selling out venues, not to mention the fact that they have faced so many barriers on their way to success, they are a testament to the notion of ‘do what you love’.
I’ve been listening to music from their self-named album ‘Cymande’ most days since then. For fans of funk, they’re a great listen.
2. If you were to become Prime Minister of the UK tomorrow, what would be your first policy promises? How about we go for two - a more silly one and another directly related to your work at LDS.
I think my more serious policy would be financial support for smaller companies who have measured their emissions and fully committed to a net zero strategy. This would allow us to really incentivise this kind of business practice, hopefully making it more widespread and driving the industry to more environmentally sustainable standards.
Secondly, I’d make it mandatory to replace artificial lawns with real grass and plants. They’re important rest stops for insects and pollinators (and look much nicer, I think).
3. What would you say you are looking forward to most this year? Both from a personal and a professional standpoint? Like a music festival, a trip abroad, or some piece of government legislation!
What I’m looking forward to for both are sort of the same - I’m heading to Paris (for the first time) in August with tickets to the Olympics. Having missed them whilst they were in London, I’m excited to experience a city buzzing with excitement.
And from a professional standpoint, I’ve heard recently that this Olympics is being touted as “the most sustainable ever”, so I’m intrigued to know how that translates in practice. The organisers have introduced this interesting idea of a “material footprint”, basically a map of all the equipment and resources required for the Games, and are really taking strides to reduce their consumption. Let’s see if it lives up!
4. So, you work in the Love Nature and the Net Zero departments of Love Design Studio. Could you tell us how you got involved with LDS and what interests you about these areas of the business?
I joined LDS not long after graduating from my Masters programme in Bio-Integrated Design. In between I had a brief research role investigating the use of materials in the workshops of UCL’s architecture school. I learned a lot about the circular economy and net zero strategy and decided to pursue a career along similar lines. I applied to LDS not long after and started on a net zero project pretty much immediately.
My involvement in the Love Nature group was driven by my background in biology. In my opinion, there has been a significant blind spot in how we discuss sustainability within the built environment industry. Though it’s great that a lot has been done to reduce emissions associated with construction, the impacts on ecology and biodiversity often get overlooked. There’s a lot of scope for improvement there.
5. If you were to give a summary of the work that you do and how you do it at LDS, what would that be?
I’m overseeing the development of the Love Nature working group at LDS. We offer ecology and biodiversity assessment services, amongst other things. So, I spend some time on site identifying habitats and species, and then using that to create a strategy for how they might be protected and retained post-development.
I’ve also been heavily involved with the net zero strategy side of things which requires quite a different approach. Initially, we work with companies to calculate their emissions levels and then we design a bespoke strategy for how they can reduce them and eventually achieve net zero status.
6. With regards to the work you’ve completed recently, are there any examples of your work or case studies that you’re just really proud of and would be able to share with us?
A really interesting project I was involved in recently was part of a fundraising campaign for a community centre in north-east London. We carried out a holistic sustainability assessment of the proposal and made recommendations to help the design team create a highly efficient and effective space. We considered hempcrete as a product to help control the internal thermal performance and studied the effectiveness with computational fluid dynamic modelling techniques.
It was nice to work on something that felt connected to community, while also being quite novel and pioneering in terms of the materials being used. The added benefit being that the site was near my neighbourhood so I’m looking forward to visiting once it’s (hopefully) completed!
7. It’s good to see how proud you are of your work. What would you say the main, tangible benefits or outputs of this case study were?
Aside from the benefit of working on a space which will directly impact people’s lives in a positive way, I was working on some aspects of building evaluation which were new to me, so I learned a couple of entirely new skills along the way. Namely, I was carrying out overheating assessments to understand how the building copes with extreme temperature conditions.
These assessments were for both now and in the future, i.e. after any further changes in climate.
8. Relating both to how it pertains to your work at LDS and with government regulations more generally, what are the key changes you would like to see within the realms of biodiversity, nature, and net zero with regards to housing in the UK?
There’s growing evidence that access to high-quality green spaces is critical for both mental and physical health in urban environments. Sadly, many people, particularly people of lower socioeconomic backgrounds, tend not to live in close proximity to these greener areas.
The UK government is currently predicting that 300,000 new homes will need to be built annually and, unless we can ensure that each of these new developments provides suitable green space for their residents, this issue will only get worse in future.
The Green Infrastructure Framework, which is a commitment in the Government’s 25 Year Environment Plan, includes guidance for local planning authorities to provide substantial and effective green space. This includes the Accessible Green Space Standard, which advocates for universal access to green and blue space within a 15-minute walk from someone’s home. It would be really good to see this being enforced and enacted across UK cities.
9. For those developers reading this article, what would you say are the key changes they need to be aware of with regards to these areas and what they should do to prepare for them?
I think that perhaps the guidance on how developers can achieve biodiversity net gain hasn’t been communicated as well as it could have been. There are a couple of useful articles and resources out there though; for example, this checklist demonstrates what is required.
But if they’re unsure, they should reach out to us!
10. Thanks for your contributions Will! Any plans for the weekend?
Hoping for good weather this weekend as I’m camping at a festival south of London. Fingers crossed!
Thank you Will!