Sustainability assessment and reporting in property development: a case study

Abstract

Property development is a highly complex issue with outputs having widespread and long-lasting ramifications that can affect many different stakeholders. Property developers can play a significant role in enhancing the sustainability of urban developments; their activities result in a variety of economic, social and environmental impacts—the three key strands in which sustainable development is couched. This paper presents the development of an assessment and reporting framework for a particular property developer company (PDC). The development of the framework was based initially on a ‘bottom-up’/input-driven process and then on a ‘top-down’/output-driven approach. The problems and advantages of each and the lessons learnt in the development of the methodology are described using a systems methodology. The resulting top-down assessment approach is simple to apply, easy to characterise and relies on the self-assessment of a small number of strategic indicators by project managers. This systems-level approach also made it easier to capture high-level emergent properties of each development project in terms of its contribution to sustainable development. The methodology and assessment framework could easily be adapted for other property developers and construction generally, and so contribute to the creation of a more sustainable built environment.