• China’s 2035 Climate Pledge, Explained: What Xi Actually Promised and What It Means for Existing Buildings

    On September 24, 2025, President Xi Jinping used a UN climate forum to put a new waypoint on China’s decarbonization path: by 2035, China will reduce economy-wide greenhouse-gas emissions by 7–10% below peak levels—with a commitment to “strive to do better.” The announcement also included a major scale-up of clean…

  • What Does It Mean to Renovate Well?

    Reflections on the Art and Responsibility of Re-Designing Our Built Environment by Yann Defrance Renovation is a word that often carries the idea of cosmetic refresh: a new façade, updated finishes, or the replacement of outdated systems. But in the context of sustainability and decarbonization, renovating well is not simply…

  • Shanghai Launches Comprehensive Carbon Market Reform (2026–2030)

    A Strategic Pivot Toward Carbon Leadership In 2025, the Shanghai Municipal Government released a landmark reform plan to reshape its carbon market between 2026 and 2030. The initiative is designed to align with China’s national “dual carbon” goals—peaking emissions before 2030 and achieving carbon neutrality by 2060—while positioning Shanghai as…

  • André Missenard, the French Engineer Who Measured Comfort Before the World Caught Up

    Abstract André Missenard (1901–1989) was a French engineer whose pioneering work on thermal comfort remains embedded in the very fabric of modern building standards. Decades before the international adoption of the PMV/PPD model and ASHRAE’s global reach, Missenard introduced concepts and tools that directly shaped the way engineers understand, measure,…

  • The Body Doesn’t Feel Temperature — Only Heat Loss

    Why André Missenard’s insight still matters for building design and energy efficiency When French engineer André Missenard remarked, “The human body can only register a change in heat loss, not a temperature”, he was not making a semantic distinction — he was challenging how we think about comfort, climate control,…

  • Revisiting the Philosophy of Energy

    What is energy, really? Not just kilowatt-hours, or thermal flows through walls—but conceptually? This question might seem abstract, even philosophical. And yet, in the work we do at BAARCH—an engineering consultancy rooted in building decarbonization—it has become increasingly important. We often design for energy efficiency without questioning the nature of…

  • When Buildings Don’t Behave

    There’s a longstanding assumption in engineering that well-designed systems, once deployed, will behave predictably. If the HVAC equipment is efficient, the BMS programmed correctly, and the lighting logic smartly automated, then performance will follow. We are trained to trust this process — to model, simulate, optimize, and refine until the…

  • Energy Efficiency Starts with People

    Every building tells two stories: one written by its systems, and the other by the people who tend them. Too often, we fixate on the first—on fancy controls, AI dashboards, and endless streams of data—while the second remains untold. At BAARCH, we believe true energy performance emerges from the intersection…

  • Hybrid Heating for Real Resilience

    As the pressure mounts to decarbonize buildings, the conversation around heating technologies has grown increasingly polarized. Electrification is often presented as the sole path forward, with heat pumps positioned as the universal solution. While heat pumps are an essential tool in the transition, relying on them exclusively, regardless of context,…