Buildings Day at COP 21:
Mobilizing the Building and Construction Sector for Climate Action

The Building Focus Thematic event (“Buildings Day”) will take place on 3 December 2015 in Paris, France, during the 21st session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 21) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Organized by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) and the World Green Building Council (WGBC), the Building Focus Thematic event is one of 12 Thematic Focus events being organized under the Lima-Paris Action Agenda (LPAA).

The LPAA is a joint undertaking of the Peruvian and French COP presidencies, the Office of the UN Secretary-General and the UNFCCC Secretariat. The LPAA was announced in December 2014, with the objective of strengthening climate action throughout 2015, at COP 21 and beyond. It seeks to demonstrate that the transition to low-emission and climate-resilient development is both urgent and feasible, with state and non-state actors creating and implementing initiatives and generating momentum for climate action in different action areas. The 12 Thematic Focus events are official high-level thematic events where stakeholders will present issues in their action area and showcase solution pathways to tackle these issues.

The aim of Buildings Day is to provide an opportunity to launch an alliance of organizations collectively committed to: helping to put the buildings and construction sector on the “below 2°C path”; aligning existing initiatives, commitments and programmes to achieve greater scale and increase the pace of efficiency actions; and catalysing stronger collaboration and targeting sectoral and cross sectoral climate action and solutions for all.