How to build a better world

Dawn O’Neill is one of those quiet achievers who’s helping to change the world. As the chief executive of eWater, she’s getting rid of toxic chemicals in our kitchens and buildings. If you care about the chemicals that end up in our waterways and oceans,  you’ll be fully behind her dream that her product could be to the cleaning industry and what solar panels have been to the fossil fuel industry....

Ray Brown heads a practice of 700 people with Architectus, which, after the merger with Conrad Gargett in April this year, is now the biggest architectural practice in Australia. He’s led some of Australia’s biggest projects – from buildings to urban planning, in most sectors, from offices to rail, social housing and heritage – sometimes, for the biggest projects, in collaboration with big global...

Rob Bernard is chief sustainability officer for CBRE, the massive global property consultancy that has 115,000 people on its books across the planet and a responsibility to help transform real estate portfolios owned by the biggest institutional investors in the US where he is based, and across the world. Host: Tina Perinotto Produced by: The Fifth Estate The Fifth Estate website: www.thefifthesta...

Paolo Bevilacqua is group head of sustainability for Frasers Property Limited. The role is with the parent company that owns Fraser’s Property Australia, one of the earliest and most courageous movers on the sustainability and greening front. Think  Burwood Brickworks Shopping Centre in Melbourne, a Living Building Challenge project that really challenged the thinking on what is possible in develo...

Jua Cilliers, head of the School of Built Environment and Professor of Urban Planning at the University of Technology Sydney brings global framing to her view of the urgent challenges we face with nature and biodiversity Host: Tina Perinotto Produced by: The Fifth Estate The Fifth Estate website: www.thefifthestate.com.au Sign up to the newsletter: https://thefifthestate.com.au/subscribe  Support...

In this episode of the How to Build a Better World podcast, The Fifth Estate 's managing editor Tina Perinotto sat down with Sarah Ratcliffe, CEO of the Better Buildings Partnership, to pick her brains over several hot topics facing the real estate sector in the UK. BBP UK is a collaboration of major property owners in the UK with 51 members holding around £280 billion (A$493) worth of assets...

On this latest episode of How to Build a Better World , our managing editor Tina Perinotto talks to Mathew Nelson – the first Oceania chief sustainability officer at EY – about what’s getting big Fortune 500 companies ticking on the climate question. For someone at the big end of town, leading the sustainability team at a company that’s 300,000 strong globally, he’s remarkably down to earth and ha...

NEW PODCAST: On this latest episode of How to Build a Better World , our managing editor, Tina Perinotto, spoke with Paul King from Bentley about how new technology like building information models (BIMs) and digital twins can help designers and engineers make better choices about building design and maintenance.  It’s an exciting world that is starting to look a bit like the sci-fi image we read...

In our latest podcast, our managing editor, Tina Perinotto, spoke with Alan Pears about how he got started in the sustainability and energy efficiency space, and the “big challenge ahead of us”.  Alan Pears is probably Australia’s favourite, most trusted and reliable “go-to” authority on energy efficiency. And no wonder. He’s been around since the dawn of the environmental movement in the 1970s an...

In our latest podcast, our managing editor, Tina Perinotto, spoke with Ainsley Simpson all about the surprising world of green infrastructure. Ainsley Simpson is the chief executive officer of the Infrastructure Sustainability Council (ISC), a member-based peak body that's purpose-driven, ensuring all infrastructure delivers social, cultural, environmental and economic benefits. At The Fifth...

In our latest podcast, our managing editor, Tina Perinotto, spoke with Dan Hill all about his new role at Melbourne University’s School of Design.  Dan Hill’s got a bit of a fan club in Australia. So there was no surprise that the announcement in April that he was to be director was well received. (No pressure, Dan.) It’s a job that’s lured him back to Oz after more than 10 years away, during whic...

On our latest podcast, our managing editor, Tina Perinotto, spoke with Dr Tyson Yunkaporta about his recent book, Sand Talk: How Indigenous Thinking Can Save the World .  The Apalech clan member is a deep and wide thinker, an academic and poet who dabbles in traditional wood carving. He’s innovative, provocative, and pulls no punches when he’s talking about the impact of white settlers on this lan...

On our latest podcast, our managing editor, Tina Perinotto, spoke with Beck Dawson, who has been Sydney’s chief resilience officer since 2015. Her role basically involves worrying about the potential disasters that might befall Australia’s biggest city, and how to build resilience in the community… just in case. It’s a big job. In Beck’s case it involves 33 councils in Sydney as well as state gove...

On our latest podcast, our managing editor, Tina Perinotto, spoke with energy efficiency expert Dr Paul Bannister.  Last year, the physicist was awarded the James Harrison Medal, which is the highest honour bestowed by AIRAH, Australia’s body for the HVAC industry. Few people know more about energy efficient buildings than Dr Paul Bannister, who was one of the original architects behind the Nation...

On our latest podcast, our managing editor, Tina Perinotto, spoke with urban planner Rob Adams. Rob became Australia’s urban planning poster child when he launched an audacious goal to transform Melbourne’s CBD as director of planning at the City of Melbourne. In those days, the city was suffering from a prolonged recession. The city streets were abandoned, especially at night and on the weekends....

  In this episode, our managing editor, Tina Perinotto, spoke with Amy Marks from Autodesk, the “queen of prefab”, on why building and construction is not an industry but an ecosystem.  If the world’s buildings and cities are set to triple their footprint, as forecasters predict, sustainability will be a mighty challenge. Firstly, where are we sourcing our diminishing natural materials from? And c...

On the podcast this week, Tina Perinotto, the managing editor of The Fifth Estate , was joined by Tim Hollo, the executive director of the Green Institute. Tim’s background is fascinating. He was a political advisor to Christine Milne during the highly volatile Gillard-Rudd years, which arguably had the biggest impact on the climate agenda in Australia. He’s also had a background in environmental...

Some people have a knack for driving change, and Esther Bailey is one of them. Joining our managing editor Tina Perinotto on The Fifth Estate's podcast this week, Esther talked about what she’d been up to at NABERS, the government’s environmental rating program for buildings. NABERS has transformed the office sector and is now overhauling other energy intensive sectors, with hospitals one suc...

In this episode, the managing editor of The Fifth Estate Tina Perinotto talks to Dr Brad Pettitt, the longstanding Mayor of Fremantle. The Freo community has been receptive to Brad’s big, bold visions for a thriving, sustainable community, in fact, he says the locals actually push the council to do better.  But the portside city has had its ups and downs, and it’s already feeling the bite of clima...

If you ever need a dose of optimism, you can always rely on Professor Peter Newman, a true legend of sustainability. The professor of sustainability at Curtin University joined editor of The Fifth Estate , Tina Perinotto, on the podcast this week and worked his usual hope-inspiring magic.  He tells us why, despite what the federal government says, gas is over and done with. He tells us how there a...

In this episode, managing editor of The Fifth Estate Tina Perinotto speaks to Sally Dominguez, who calls herself an “adventurous thinker”.  She covers an array of topics, including her belief that hydrogen will be the fuel of the future, a future strategy she did for Ikea (that includes high connecting bridges in tower buildings so people feel protected from a potentially menacing climate), her lo...

In this episode, Tina Perinotto, managing editor of The Fifth Estate, talked to Head of GRESB Asia Pacific Ruben Langbroek. She was joined by our corporate partner and expert interviewer, Craig Roussac, who is chief executive officer of Buildings Alive.  The Global Real Estate Investment Benchmark (GRESB) is increasingly well recognised by institutional investors around the world, with GRESB perfo...

In this episode, managing editor of The Fifth Estate, Tina Perinotto, speaks to Caroline Pidcock, an award-winning Australian architect and advocate for sustainable design. Caroline has been pouring much of her energy into the Australian branch of Architects Declare as the group’s spokesperson, which involves working out how architects should respond to the climate and biodiversity emergencies. As...

Tina Perinotto, managing editor of The Fifth Estate, sits down with Dr Tim Williams, Australasia Cities Leader at Arup, who has played a role in some of the biggest strategic planning decisions shaping Sydney. He offers his thoughts on the wins and losses in planning in both Sydney and Melbourne, and believes mass transit and good mobility is key to making these fast-growing cities work.  Host: Ti...

In The Fifth Estate's first-ever podcast, our managing editor Tina Perinotto speaks to EnergyLab Australia co-founder and chair Piers Grove, who has a knack for sniffing out the best and brightest clean energy startups worthy of a leg up through the EnergyLab Australia accelerator program.  Host: Tina Perinotto Produced by: The Fifth Estate The Fifth Estate website: www.thefifthestate.com.au...