Invitation to the 18th Annual General Meeting of the Life Cycle Association of New Zealand
Date: Thursday 17th September 2026
Time: 3:00pm to 6:00pm
Venue: Online (Teams) and Mott MacDonald, 30 Daldy Street,
Auckland CBD
Online: Teams – details will be emailed to all registered attendees
Registration: Humanitix
Programme:
3:00pm to 4:00pm – LCANZ AGM with following agenda
- President’s report
- Treasurer’s report
- Committee elections
- LCANZ Updates:
- Best Practice Working Group
- Professional Development sub-committee
- EPD Australasia update
- General business
4:00pm to 5:00pm – Member Presentations
1) Before the design is locked: making LCA useful at concept stage – Rebecca Mills and Rosie Dodd, The Lever Room
Released in March 2026, EN 15978:2026 explicitly recognises assessment using an early building model at concept design. That puts a practical challenge into sharper focus: how do we use carbon evidence when the design is still evolving, information is incomplete, and some of the most consequential choices are still open?
Drawing on recent whole-building carbon work with architects, Rebecca Mills and Rosie Dodd of The Lever Room will explore how life-cycle evidence can inform better decisions early while retaining the rigour needed as a project develops.
They will discuss:
What carbon information is most useful when key design decisions are still open.
How data, assumptions and uncertainty should evolve as a design becomes more resolved.
What complex issues such as biogenic carbon and end-of-life can teach us about applying LCA in practice.
Rebecca Mills
Rebecca Mills is Founder and CEO of The Lever Room and a biosphere scientist with more than 30 years’ experience across sustainability, climate and regenerative development. Her built-environment experience includes serving as Principal of Sustainable Design and Construction for the UK Environment Agency and supporting the development of New Zealand’s Homestar residential rating tool. Rebecca also co-designed the founding strategy for The B Team, has served on the boards of two New Zealand National Science Challenges, and holds an MSc in Biosphere Science with impact measurement training from Oxford’s Saïd Business School.
Rosie Dodd
Rosie Dodd is an environmental scientist and sustainability strategist at The Lever Room. She works across carbon accounting and assessment, nature-related risk and circular economy, spanning products, buildings, organisations and investment portfolios. Her experience across New Zealand, the UK and Europe includes work with organisations such as Nestlé, Dyson, Dr. Martens and New Zealand Winegrowers. Rosie has a particular interest in turning detailed environmental evidence into practical, defensible decisions.
2) EPDs before launch: credible environmental data from day one – Jeff Vickers, thinkstep-anz and Israel McDonald, NZ Steel & Pacific Steel
EPDs are not only for products already on the market. Israel MacDonald from NZ Steel and thinkstep-anz Technical Director Jeff Vickers will explore how EPDs can be developed before product launch, giving businesses credible environmental data from day one. Drawing on NZ Steel’s experience, they will discuss how early EPD development can support environmental claims, meet programme requirements and create competitive advantage before a new product reaches the market.
Jeff Vickers
Jeff Vickers, Technical Director at thinkstep-anz is an expert in assessing complex product life cycles ranging from buildings to agriculture, transport to electronics. He focuses on sustainability strategy, Life Cycle Assessments (LCAs) and Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs). Jeff has been embedding sustainability thinking within organisations for over a decade, and has been working across sustainability assessment, strategy and innovation. He sits on the Green Building Council of Australia’s LCA Expert Panel and the LCANZ Best Practice Working Group.
Israel MacDonald
Israel has over a decade in steel and heavy manufacturing, having worked across the entire steel supply chain – mining, ironmaking, steelmaking, reinforcing bar production & quality assurance. As the sustainability manager for NZ Steel & Pacific Steel, Israel helps create opportunities for more sustainable collaboration between steel & manufacturing, with the wider building, construction & infrastructure sectors. Israel also contributes to several industry boards & committees and currently chairs Metals NZ.
3) Woody Biomass for Bioenergy can support decarbonization – Zara Balador, WSP
This study presents a comparative Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of woody biomass-based bioenergy pathways in New Zealand, evaluating their environmental performance and potential contribution to energy sector decarbonization for EECA and TUR. Ten pathways were assessed across different feedstocks, forestry regimes, geographic regions, and energy outputs, including heat and electricity generation from white pellets, torrefied pellets, and wood chips produced from Eucalyptus nitens, Eucalyptus fastigata, and Pinus radiata. The results demonstrate that all biomass pathways offer substantial greenhouse gas emission reductions compared with fossil fuel alternatives. The best overall environmental performance was achieved by pathways utilising white and torrefied pellets from plantation forests for industrial heat generation, highlighting their potential as a low-carbon energy solution.
Zara Balador
Dr. Zara Balador is a Principal Sustainability Consultant/ BES Decarbonisation Lead at WSP, with expertise in life cycle assessment, climate adaptation, and sustainable building certification. Combining industry, research, and academic experience, she helps organisations deliver evidence-based sustainability outcomes across the built environment and infrastructure sectors.
5:00pm to 6:00pm – Networking
LCANZ networking over drinks and nibbles.
We look forward to seeing you there!
Nominee bios 2026 |
