The Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE) is the government's advisor on architecture, urban design and public space. As well working directly with architects, developers and other construction and design professionals on areas such as housing and school design, CABE also undertakes work in wider fields, including sustainability, inclusion and health. Paula Vandergert is Senior Advisor at CABE.

Please give me some background information on CABE, and the kind of projects on which it works/advises:

CABE works with clients, developers, architects, planners and designers. We offer them guidance on the projects that shape our everyday lives, such as homes, schools and hospitals. But it's not just about buildings: parks and open spaces are as important as bricks and mortar. We want to encourage those making the decisions to create places that are safe, beautiful and efficient to run.

We help clients get better value through better design. This includes encouraging them to take the best approach right from the start, showing them what mistakes to avoid and what opportunities to seize.

One way that we do this is CABE's free design review service. And here we have made a huge difference. Eighty-five per cent of local authorities have chosen to use design review over the last 10 years - and 70 per cent subsequently made planning decisions that took our advice on board. Take, for example, schemes like Liverpool One and Sheffield's Millennium Square - both built better as a result of our advice.

CABE is now 10-years-old. And we've looked at what we've achieved in that decade: how we've helped local decision-makers choose good design and get better value for money; what we've done for better homes and quality of life; what we've offered schools; and - hugely important and where my work comes in - what we're doing about sustainability and climate change.

CABE works on behalf of the public - we want to inspire people to demand more from buildings and spaces and for the industry to create a built environment that its users need - all of them.

Our 10-year review gives you a good idea of how we are doing that.

What is your role within CABE?

I'm responsible for taking forward CABE's sustainable cities programme. This is an ambitious initiative to advise the people responsible for planning, designing and managing town and cities how best to respond to climate change. As cities go low carbon, they should simultaneously become much better places to live and work.

In March 2009 we launched the website www.sustainablecities.org.uk. This is the result of a two-year research programme by CABE with the eight core English cities and some 30 of the UK's most influential built environment and sustainability experts. What it does is cut through the complexities of the climate change debate. In particular, it gives insights into the different actions that need to be at different spatial scales - from individual buildings to regions.

There's a report that goes with it - Hallmarks of a sustainable city - where we define what we mean by a sustainable place, and set out what needs to be done at a practical and policy level to ensure that we get well-designed, low carbon places.

What does CABE see as being the architect's role in creating a sustainable built environment?

The most important thing for all architects is to influence clients to get the brief right so that what they build is more sustainable.

Approximately 45 per cent of the UK's carbon emissions come from the construction and use of our homes and other buildings. But a review by CABE in 2008 of 700 planned major construction and housing schemes showed that the challenge of climate change had been taken seriously in only a fraction of them.

Of all the built environment professionals, it is architects who should have the training and skills to be able to lead a design in an integrated way. This means undertaking a proper analysis of the context; thinking beyond the red line boundary of the client's site; and advising the client which other built environment professionals to bring in at which stage in the project - and this is usually much earlier than people think.

Can traditional architectural values and sustainable design work alongside each other?

Many traditional building types have evolved using the principles of passive design, such as making the most of the orientation of the building and thermal mass. The advantages of passive design for creating low carbon buildings that are resilient to climate change are now increasingly recognised.

Bringing the tried and tested together with new techniques could be the answer to the low-energy, loose-fit, long-life buildings that we now need as both climate and technology changes. The key is to design-in flexibility and avoid lock-in to choices that will prevent us from coping with what the future holds.

How should the balance between carbon-neutral new-build properties and energy-efficient retrofitting be addressed?

Both are important. But the number of existing buildings that need to be retrofitted is vast - around 75 per cent of current building stock will still be standing in 2050. This is much more challenging than making new stock energy efficient.

There are a range of different solutions, such as insulation, double glazing and more modern heating systems. What's needed is for cities to work strategically to coordinate funding options to assist homeowners with the costs and also addressing the property they run or manage.

But every building being built now that isn't sustainable - in both its design and use - is just adding to the problem, so we also need high standards of sustainability for all new buildings.

Rather than looking at the problem on a property by property basis, however, we need to think more strategically. We need to look at the bigger picture, at a whole neighbourhood or an even wider area. What other opportunities might there be for making it more sustainable, as well as retrofitting individual homes and buildings? Retrofitting will involve a certain amount of disruption, so why not look at what more can be achieved at the same time - such as new or improved green spaces - that will improve quality of life?

We need to keep in mind how things interconnect and join up. If, for example, you have a well designed network of green spaces, this will reduce the urban heat island effect and alleviate some of the worst effects of flooding - and at the same encourage health, recreation and well-being. If you put in a transport system that is reliable, pleasant to use and affordable, you should be able to reduce car use and cut carbon emissions - and also encourage businesses to invest. And energy-efficient homes will reduce bills and help with fuel poverty.

This is where www.sustainablecities.org.uk becomes really helpful - it shows how different interventions are often mutually reinforcing.

What should government be doing to push forward sustainability/low carbon issues within the built environment?

Urban design and creating high quality places are at the heart of sustainability - including the low carbon agenda. And this is what the sustainable cities programme supports. It helps towns and cities respond to climate change through sustainable placemaking. It helps them develop thinking on how urban design and management contribute towards creating low carbon, resilient places - better quality places that improve everyone's quality of life and well-being.

www.sustainablecities.org.uk shows how important it is to think and plan at the appropriate spatial scale. If the government can support the development of the right responses at the right scale - such as neighbourhood retrofitting, city-wide sustainable masterplanning, and integrated and sustainable transport at a sub-regional level - this will help local authorities make the right choices for their communities.

Also important is joined-up action - identifying how to meet a number of sustainability goals, not just one, through a particular intervention. For example, looking across neighbourhoods and seeing if green infrastructure will not only make a place more resilient to climate change but also encourage people to walk and cycle more, make neighbourhoods more pleasant, improve health and well-being, and attract investment. This sort of thinking becomes ever more important as budgets are tightened and creative ways to deliver efficiency are sought.

One of our recommendations in Hallmarks of a sustainable city was for Communities and Local Government (CLG) and the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) to work together on a sustainable neighbourhoods scheme. This will shift the agenda beyond individual homes or estates and spur on thinking about what can be achieved at neighbourhood level. We're currently working with both departments, and other partners such as the Sustainable Development Commission, to see how we can make this happen.

In May this year the government launched its strategy for improving quality of place - World class places. This sets out the practical steps it will take to build on the achievements of recent years - and do more to create prosperous, attractive, distinctive, inclusive and sustainable places.

Using urban design to adapt society to climate change is indentified as an urgent priority. And to help this, the government has made a commitment to apply a minimum design standard to every public building programme; to develop new planning policy on green infrastructure and new guidance of the design of high-streets and other non-residential roads; and to strengthen regional support for local authorities and developers in order to improve quality of place.

Are carbon-related government targets (all new-build homes to be carbon neutral by 2016, an 80% reduction in carbon emissions by 2050) achievable?

The government has shown bold leadership in setting these targets. We all need to work towards achieving them; if we and other countries don't, we face a perilous future. The key is to set milestones along the way to the ultimate goal that stretch our ambitions, and are also achievable.

It's important, though, to put policies in place to support this and avoid conflicts. Looking beyond the red line boundary can often make targets more achievable. Again, this is an opportunity to see how creating quality places on a wider scale can contribute to meeting targets.

These targets are all about carbon - there are many other issues that also need to be considered - but they are a useful prism through which to view the wider picture.

Will low energy / sustainability concerns eventually become of prime importance for all architects?

If these concerns are not already a priority for architects, they should be, and should have been a long time ago. The same goes for their clients.

Some architects are definitely producing schemes that are going in the right direction - and we should be learning from them.

Look, for example, at: the Allerton Bywater housing scheme in Castleford, West Yorkshire, designed by PRP Architects; the Manchester Civil Justice Centre by Denton Corker Marshall; the Jubilee Library in Brighton by Bennetts Associates; White Design's Kingsmead Primary School in Northwich, Cheshire, and Worcestershire County Council's Red Hill C of E Primary School; Liverpool's St Francis of Assisi Academy by Capita Percy Thomas; and Great Bow Yard in Langport, Somerset, a forward-thinking sustainable development of 12 homes designed by Treglown Architects.

The skills to deliver low energy, sustainable developments are of course essential for all built environment professionals. And resources are being developed to support this, for example through the National Skills Action Plan to which CABE is contributing, the UK Green Building Council and the professional institutes. But the scale of the task is enormous and much more still needs to be done.

Will 'sustainable cities' and eco-towns become more common in the near future, and what needs to be done to ensure their effectiveness?

The report that we published with BioRegional last year - What makes an eco-town? - was inspired by the government's eco-towns challenge panel. It defines an eco-town as a place designed to make it easy for those living there to reduce their ecological footprint by two thirds and their carbon dioxide emissions by 80 per cent below 1990 levels.

And it sets out what will help us to live within ecological limits: all new residential developments meeting the Building for Life gold standard, for example; a 100 per cent renewal energy supply; generous space to grow food; ample tree cover; attractive alternatives to shopping as the default leisure activity; and a greatly reduced dependency on the car.

If eco-towns are to do one thing, it must be to show how we can all live and work in well designed, low carbon neighbourhoods. It's encouraging to see places like Aspect Upton Way in Northamptonshire or the BedZED eco-village in Surrey. But there's nothing yet on the scale of projects that we see in Germany or Sweden and there needs to be - fast.

We need to see trailblazing projects that move industry best practice forward, inform government policy and show how we can reduce our impact to sustainable levels and enjoy an improved quality of life. We should take inspiration from these places and get on with it.

But our existing urban environment also has a significant contribution to make towards creating sustainable places. What's needed is for local leaders to ensure that existing places are looked at across the whole range of sustainability objectives and that long-term planning revolves around improving well-being, quality of life, economic vibrancy and environmental quality.

www.sustainablecities.org.uk focuses on what towns and cities can influence and control through sustainable urban design and management to respond to climate change - and at the same time create sustainable places where people want to live, work and locate their businesses. Location, sustainable masterplanning and the provision of the appropriate infrastructure for new and existing places are the fundamentals that we must get right.

How important a factor is occupant behaviour/attitude to lowering the energy output of a building?

People's attitudes and how they use a building are among the most important aspects of a building's energy efficiency. Display Energy Certificates documenting the actual energy consumption of a building are a very useful way to show not only how efficient a building is but also how occupants are using energy.

It's important that the people using the building know how to operate it properly. Making buildings so complicated that people can't operate them easily reduces their efficiency - as well as people's perception of how comfortable they are as they live or work in them.

Also important, though, is urban design. This can help people make low energy choices. For example, having easy access to local transport, schools, shops and healthcare - and a high-quality urban environment - will reduce dependence on the car. In other European countries where cycling and walking are much more popular than here, there are the same number of cars per person but people tend to choose to use other means of getting about because the safe and pleasant infrastructure is there to encourage it.

For more information on CABE, visit: http://www.cabe.org.uk/

"Ambitious" energy-efficiency needed

Energy efficiency in homes can be improved by up to 35% by 2020 if an "ambitious program of improved insulation" is adopted, according to a report by the Committee on Climate Change (CCC). Installation of energy-efficient boilers and improvements in electrical appliance efficiency are among the measures that need to be implemented, claims the CCC's first annual report to Parliament. The report claims that a 'change of pace' and new policy approaches are necessary in order for the government's Low Carbon Transition Plan and carbon reduction targets to be met: http://www.theccc.org.uk/news/press-releases/477-uk-needs-to-achieve-a-step-change-in-its-pace-of-emissions-reduction-to-meet-carbon-budgets-12-october-2009

Coalition calls for legislation

A coalition of environmental NGOs is calling for EU institutions and member states to adopt more rigorous legislation to reduce energy use from buildings, specifically from heating and cooling methods and systems. The coalition estimates that such measures could cut Europe's annual carbon emissions by 230 million tonnes by 2020, and claim that the current Energy Performance of Buildings Directive fails to introduce enough stringent energy reduction measures: http://www.coolproducts.eu/cool_blog_archive_Press_release_Green_groups_demand_new_EU_laws_to_end_energy_waste_in_buildings_73.aspx

Passivhaus petition

An e-petition to make Passivhaus-certified buildings exempt from stamp duty has been launched on the government's Number10.gov.uk website. Created by architectural firm Ecotecture, the petition was launched to recognise the importance of Passivhaus structures in reducing carbon emissions, in light of the government's recent decision to make homes at Level 6 of the CSH (Code For Sustainable Homes) stamp duty-free. "Rather than saying one solution should be in place of the other. Lets [sic] be reasonable and use both when each is appropriate", said Jake White, Director of Ecotecture: http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/Passivhaus-S-D/

Energy makeovers to tackle fuel poverty

Home insulation and "whole house energy makeovers" for low income homes are among the measures proposed by government to tackle fuel poverty and reduce energy bills for households. An extension to the 2012 Carbon Emissions Reduction Target will increase obligations on energy companies to assist vulnerable households, and energy companies will also work with local authorities to deliver £350 million of energy-efficiency measures, primarily to 90,000 homes around the UK in low-income neighbourhoods. The measures arise in response to the latest fuel poverty figures, which show that 2.8 million homes in England were classed as fuel poor in 2007: http://www.decc.gov.uk/en/content/cms/news/pn121/pn121.aspx