Navigating Sustainability 2025: Building/unbuilding - what construction needs now

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02 Building/unbuilding - what construction needs now

Construction productivity is appalling. We know. But the Productivity Commission report in February said it was not only the worst of any industry, it's gone backwards. There's also a housing crisis, and now a lot of hope riding on new methods of construction (MMC) or pre-fab to solve both these problems. Alongside this is the urgent need for circularity and the electrification of buildings.

What we need now is brilliant.

At this event, you'll hear three of the best speakers in Australia and globally as they open up the possibilities emerging from the combination of technology, better business models, and sheer imagination. Not to mention the powers of persuasion.

Lasse Lind's companies, Danish-based GXN and 3XN, specialise in circular design (designing for disassembly), behavioural design (how people interact with buildings), and technology to push innovation to make buildings more sustainable. GXN designed Circle House in Denmark, where "90 per cent of its building materials are intended for future re-use". It's critical, he says, to embrace the unloved older buildings that are so valuable for their embodied carbon. In Sydney, 3XN has designed Quay Quarter and the Sydney Fish Markets, hailed as the next global icon following that other Danish-designed icon, the Sydney Opera House.

Karl-Heinz Weiss is Lendlease's former guru on MMC. He is one of the handful of insiders in Australia who can unpack this complex but promising innovation. It can open the doors to alternative, more sustainable materials and maybe help our housing crisis resolve. Weiss says it's not technology that has stood in the way of a successful MMC; it is the business model. He's now consulting on a new MMC factory in Orange, NSW, that brings back to life the mothballed kit from Lendlease's former DesignMake factory in Western Sydney.

Ross Harding of Finding Infinity blends his engineering skills with the force of his prodigious imagination and ability to cultivate motivation across an extraordinarily diverse group of people in the built environment to generate concepts and projects that offer templates for a massive step change in sustainability for buildings and cities.

Adrian Hart, head of construction and infrastructure at Oxford Economics, will deliver a scene-setting address on why productivity in housing and construction is critical and how to achieve it. Adrian is one of Australia’s most respected economists in this critical part of the economy.
His specialist knowledge includes infrastructure, building and maintenance.

Maria Atkinson, our moderator, is one of Australia's most respected green building and sustainability experts. She's a board director of several companies and NSW Net Zero Commissioner.

Audience Hot Spot Intensive (3-5 mins) 

Adrian Harrington on why housing needs to be a bi-partisan issue. Adrian is chair NSW Housing All Australians and a former chair of the National Housing Finance and Investment Corporation

Leaders - the bios

Karl-Heinz Weiss: As the founder and director of Weiss Insights, Weiss focuses on consultancy and advisory focusing on whole of life-cycle efficiency and productivity challenges and opportunities. He is Lendlease’s former guru on modern methods of construction and built UK's first prefab high-rise. His experience is gained through first-hand experience across the whole construction lifecycle from design, manufacture and traditional construction and development through to his pioneering work in engineered timber technology. This includes all aspects of design from feasibility to architectural and structural design, from customer interaction, all the way through to execution including manufacturing, logistics and site planning and completion. Weiss is also Professor of Practice in the Architecture Department, Monash University in Melbourne and a Member of the Future Building Research Initiative and drive research with a focus on industrial building - strategies, practices and platforms

Lasse Lind: Lasse Lind is the Head of Circularity and partner at GXN, the innovation unit of 3XN. Specialising in sustainability and the circular economy within the construction industry, Lind has led pioneering projects that emphasise the reuse and adaptability of building materials. A notable example is Circle House, Denmark's first circular social housing project, designed so that 90% of its building materials can be reused in the future. Under Lasse's leadership, GXN also played a significant role in the CIRCuIT (Circular Construction in Regenerative Cities) project, which aimed to transition urban construction towards circular practices by preserving resources within the built environment for as long as possible. Lasse advocates for architects to act as mediators among various professions, engaging with stakeholders across the value chain—from demolition contractors to facility managers—to foster systemic change towards sustainability, in materiality, design and construction, aligned with the principles of a circular economy.

Ross Harding: Equal part's troublemaker, technical mind, and creative, Harding is one of the most enthusiastic, optimistic and cheeky engineers you’ve ever met. A rare combination of dreamer and schemer: he thinks big picture about transforming cities around the world to become completely self-sufficient. At the same time, working tirelessly with his team at Finding Infinity to actually make it happen.  Operating across a range of scales from city-wide master planning to precincts, building design, and even temporary events, Finding Infinity are doing their best at turning dreams into reality. Short for finding a future based on infinite resources, Finding Infinity is a creative and technical environmental consultancy. His team of 10 unique characters based in Melbourne consist of architects, engineers, artists, urban agriculture specialists and more. Best known for “A New Normal”: a $100 billion strategy to transform Melbourne into a self-sufficient city together with 15 architecture firms. Conceptualised and initiated in his living room in Fitzroy, A New Normal now has over $200 million worth of live projects spread across Melbourne. 

Each project delivers profitable examples with the private sector, engages with the general public in a colourful way, and is specifically designed to inform much needed policy.

$95+ fees, TFE Members just $35+fees tickets. If you are not a TFE member, join now!