Building Assessment Systems Research Articles

Always with the Best Intentions? Interrogating the Use of Sustainable Building Assessment Systems in Developing Countries: Kenya

Assessment methodologies such as BREEAM and LEED allocate points based on prescribed interventions that promote design features or strategies considered to be more sustainable than others. A focus on accumulating numerical scores, however, often fails to address pertinent contextual issues, particularly within developing countries. This paper examines the use of four assessment systems in Kenya—two international systems, LEED-US and Green Star SA-Kenya; and two locally developed systems, Green Mark Kenya and the Safari Green Building Index. The paper compares the relative weighting of different categories under each system, and assesses their appropriateness to a Kenyan context, with reference to the suitability of active technology versus passive design approaches. The paper examines selected examples of ‘green’ buildings in Nairobi, reflecting on the influence of different methods of assessment on the adopted design approaches. The paper argues that international rating systems, such as LEED, often focus on a Western construct of sustainability featuring a systematic bias towards global rather than local perspectives, with an emphasis on physical environmental factors. In pursuit of objectivity, the measurement of non-contextual parameters untailored to local circumstances (e.g., energy performance) is prioritised at the expense of those contingent on local conditions or climate.

Analysis of Environmentally Certified Residential Developments in Poland

Abstract The scale of environmental pressure caused by the construction sector has prompted a search for new technical solutions to minimize the negative impact of this part of the national economy on the environment. The drive to evaluate the adopted solutions has led to the creation of building assessment systems - environmental certificates. The aim of the article is both to introduce the certification processes used in the Polish residential property market and to indicate the locations of residential investments that have obtained the certificates in question. The paper takes a closer look at environmental certification using multi-criteria building assessment systems, i.e. BREEAM, LEED and HQE. The time scope of the presented research covered the years 2016 to the first quarter of 2022. The research carried out allowed an upward trend to be observed in the number of environmental certificates awarded, indicating the use of green building principles for residential properties. It is certain that there has been a development of this type of investment in Poland in the recent years. An analysis of the spatial distribution of the surveyed investments shows that location clusters have formed - green (low-emission) residential investments are distributed in the largest cities in Poland, which are characterized by a strictly defined consumer profile.

The suitability of the MOSTADAM system with the global systems of sustainability in the desert city, Case study ( North Narjes project in KSA)

Sustainable building practices are becoming increasingly important today, especially in desert areas with more severe environmental challenges. Numerous sustainable building assessment systems are available globally and locally, but their effectiveness and applicability in desert areas are poorly understood[1]. The world’s desert regions are facing unique environmental challenges, and sustainable building practices are becoming more important than ever. By comparing various assessment systems, we hope to identify the most effective and applicable methods for sustainable building in these areas. This research aims to compare global and local sustainable building assessment systems in desert areas to identify the most effective and suitable systems.Applying this to a sustainable program, which is one of the programs offered by the Ministry of Municipal, Rural Affairs and Housing (MOMRAH) in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA)[1], where the research will mean studying its suitability within desert Areas.

Development of a Green Building Assessment System at The Green Building Planning Stage in Indonesia

The fact that more people are living in cities is an important challenge for the construction industry in designing and developing cities. This industry emphasizes to have sustainable construction development principles, one of which is Green Building strategies. Because of this, several developed countries have implemented Green Building Rating Systems (GBRS) to assess Green Building achievements. Green Building Rating Systems were developed to help professionals measure building performance, and meet the requirements of sustainable design and construction. In Indonesia, there are 2 assessment standards as a Green Building Rating System, namely PUPR Ministerial Regulation No. 21 of 2021 which is a regulation issued by the Ministry of PUPR as the Ministry in charge of Public Works and Public Housing Affairs in this case includes buildings and GREENSHIP as a product of the Green Building Council Indonesia (GBCI), which is a independent institution. Different GBRS have similar objectives such as verifying the environmental performance of buildings, using natural resources efficiently, estimating the energy performance of buildings, and encouraging more energy-efficient building designs. The purpose of this research is to identify Green Building variables that are most suitable and relevant to the current conditions in Indonesia with a comparative analysis.

The Influence of Construction Project Management on the Planning and Design of Residential Green Buildings

<p>我國綠建築評估系統EEWH至今已有20年歷史，然而在住宿類建築當中綠建築標章案件數仍僅占總使用執照數量1%以下，標章案之總樓地板面積僅占總使用執照總樓地板面積20%以下，因此對於推廣綠建築之成果仍有進步空間。分析綠建築申請率低的原因，包含大眾認為綠建築之成本較高、綠建築標章之總建築專案期程較久、所需之審查資料繁多…等。再者，申請綠建築標章時之分數常少於申請候選綠建築證書時之分數，甚至有案件未申請綠建築標章。專案管理係指對於專案生命週期之各項工作項目予以妥善管理，以減少專案成果與預期目標的落差。於過往在建築業的案例與相關研究中，指出專案管理對於管控建築成本與工期具有實際績效，然而案例多為大型工程與廠辦類建築物，對於住宿類建築物之探討相對較少。故本研究先透過專家問卷探討建築專案管理管控綠建築指標項目之能力，以提出在專案管理思維下，設計住宿類綠建築時可優先考量採用之建築技術，以消除大眾對於綠建築在成本與時程上之顧慮。研究成果顯示，不同綠建築技術與設施設備之採用情形，對於建築專案的管控能力確實具有差異性。在EEWH-RS版本下之指標項目，以日常節能指標與二氧化碳減量指標下之指標項目，較能夠受專案管理管控。但綠化量指標、水資源指標以及汙水垃圾改善指標等，由於其技術已經成熟、成為標準配備或已規格化，致使專案管理對其無法具有較高的影響能力。研究成果係可協助建築設計師於住宿類綠建築規劃設計時，擬定出較易管控成本與時程之方案，進而提升業主採用綠建築技術與設施設備之意願。</p> <p> </p><p>Taiwan’s green building assessment system (EEWH) has a history of 20 years, but the number of green building label cases in residential buildings still accounts for less than 1% of the total number of Building Use permit, and the total floor area of the label cases are less than 20% of the total building which get Building Use permit. So there is still room for promoting the achievements of green buildings. Analyze the reasons for the low green building application rate, including the public’s view that the cost of green building is relatively high, the overall construction project period of the green building label is longer, and the amount of review information required is more than general building... Furthermore, the score for applying for a green building seal is often less than the score for applying for a candidate green building certificate. There are even cases where the green building seal is not applied. Project management refers to the proper management of various work items in the project life cycle to reduce the gap between project results and expected goals. In the past cases and related research in the construction industry, it was pointed out that project management has actual performance in controlling construction costs and duration. However, most of the cases are large-scale projects and factory buildings, and there is relatively little discussion on residential buildings. Therefore, in this study, an expert questionnaire will be used to discuss the ability of the construction project management to control the green building index project, in order to put forward the construction technology that can be considered first when designing residential-type green buildings under the project management thinking, so as to eliminate the public’s cost and schedule for green buildings Concerns. The research results show that the adoption of different green building technologies and facilities and equipment has indeed different management and control capabilities for construction projects. The indicators under the EEWH-RS version are more able to be controlled by the project management based on the daily energy saving indicators and the CO2 reduction indicators. However, the greenery indicators, water resource indicators and sewage and garbage improvement indicators, etc., because their technology has matured, become standard equipment or has been standardized, the project management cannot have a high influence on it. The research results can assist architects in the planning and design of residential-type green buildings, and draw up plans that are easier to control costs and schedules, thereby enhancing the owners’ willingness to adopt green building technologies and facilities.</p> <p> </p>

Obstacles to green building accreditation during operating phases: identifying Challenges and solutions for sustainable development

ABSTRACT Due to environmental benefits, green architecture has become increasingly popular, but many green building assessment systems predominantly evaluate design and construction rather than operational stage. This study seeks to identify the impediments to green building accreditation during the operational phases and investigate potential solutions to these issues. To reach this objective, the study compared international green building standards such as LEED, BREEAM, and Green Star with Chinese green building evaluation guidelines. The study also included functional case studies of certified buildings in order to investigate the obstacles encountered by green building initiatives in greater depth. According to the study, the greatest obstacles to green building accreditation during operating phases are inconsistencies in government regulations, market constraints that impede the developers’ interests, and difficulties in meeting technological criteria. These findings emphasize the imperative need for policymakers, market participants, and technology developers to collaborate and resolve the identified challenges in order to ensure the longevity of green buildings. Overall, this study contributes to the expanding corpus of knowledge on green building practices and offers stakeholders insights to facilitate the development of sustainable structures. By addressing the identified obstacles, the study can maximize the benefits of green buildings and promote eco-friendly building practices.

A Comparison of Typical Green Building Evaluation SystemsTaking China, UK and USA as Examples

The international investigation of green buildings is steadily transitioning from simple concepts to practice, and the assessment criteria for enhancing green buildings are conducive to enhancing the understanding of green buildings' healthy development. By following the green building movement, this research examines the fundamental meanings of green building systems in China, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The paper analyzes a variety of potential new issues. For instance, the current green building assessment system has a small number of problems and limitations, and the formation of a system suitable for national conditions and flexible operation is currently a larger problem. Through analysis of the problem, the direction of work to implement the green building system and improve the fundamental concept of China's green building system will be suggested.

Sequencing the carbon emission cycle of green buildings in China based on an ecological city perspective

As people's basic material living standards continue to rise, the demand for a better living environment and a better life is becoming increasingly strong. Since the 18th and 19th National Congresses of the Party proposed to carry out ecological civilization construction and build a beautiful China, carrying out ecological city construction has become one of the effective ways to solve the current urban development problems. In this paper, we summarise the latest research on green building assessment systems, life-cycle carbon emissions and life-cycle costs of buildings. We find that China's green building assessment system still has many shortcomings compared to the world's advanced green building assessment systems. Based on this, we have conducted a sequencing analysis of the life cycle carbon emissions of green buildings in China, so that buildings can meet the green building rating and at the same time achieve energy and carbon savings. The results of the study show that the building use phase has the highest carbon emissions in the building life cycle, accounting for 77% of the life cycle carbon emissions.

Exploring the design risks affecting operation performance of green commercial buildings in China

Despite the number of new green commercial buildings (GCBs) increases rapidly over the last decade, its operation performance has not been improved simultaneously. Risk exploration is considered as an essential way to improve project performance. Design risks, which could have significant effects on the operation performance of GCBs, should be identified. However, little research has been done on the design risk factors of GCBs with interfere of system vulnerability. Therefore, the objective of this study is to detect the impact of the design risks on the operation performance of GCBs moderated by system vulnerability in the context of China. Through systematic literature review, four categories of design risks were initially identified (design technical risks, design management risks, design behavior risks and green certification risks) and three types of system vulnerability of GCBs were distinguished (exposure, resilience and sensitivity). Structural equation modeling was employed to test the theoretical hypothesis with 481 valid questionnaires. The research findings revealed that all four categories of design risks have significant negative impacts on the operational performance of GCBs with different influence levels and behavior risk is the most influential kind of risks. Additionally, the three sets of system vulnerability play positive moderating roles for the connection between the design risks and the operational performance of GCBs. The higher the system vulnerability, the greater the negative impact of the design risks on the operational performance. The positive moderating effect of resilience is the highest, meaning that the negative impact of the design risks on the operation performance of GCBs is much more significant in case of resilience factors. The research results could offer effective and valuable information not only for designers and owners to adjust strategies to improve the operation performance of GCBs, but also for related government departments to update green building assessment systems and set up regulations for improving the actual performance of green buildings.

A dialectical system framework for green building assessment in high-density cities

Urban areas afford 56% of the world population and the top 600 cities emit 70% of the world greenhouse gases, highlighting enormous challenges and potentials of carbon emission reduction and sustainability in high-density cities. Though vast research has reviewed the green building assessment (GBA) systems in different perspectives, little has explicitly examined the dialectics of GBA, particularly its complexity and dynamics. The assessment of green buildings, however, can be regarded as a complex dynamic system with multifaceted dialectics, particularly in high-density cities. Thus, this paper aims to examine the dialectics of GBA within the context of high-density cities by identifying 42 GBA systems and then comparing 12 widely adopted systems in depth. Dialectics denote the complex and dynamic interdependency among the elements of a system. A dialectical system framework is developed to guide the systematic comparison of the GBA systems in three dimensions: ‘concept’, ‘methodology’ and ‘value’. The results reveal that dialectics exist and encounter challenges in all three dimensions, including a multi-perspective but inconsistent concept of GBA, well-organised but oversimplified methodology for GBA, and value-laden but insufficient stakeholder engagement in GBA. The developed framework provides a new approach to understanding the complex and dynamic interdependency among the various elements of GBA systems. The findings should raise the awareness of green building developers, planners and designers about the dialectics in GBA and thus inform the associated decision making and design optimisation, making it possible to more effectively achieve green buildings.

Sustainable building evaluation: a case study

ABSTRACT The building sector is one of the leading contributors to global climate change. In recent decades, sustainable building assessment systems have been introduced in developed countries to improve the overall performance of buildings and to prevent greenhouse gas emissions, the main culprit of human activities in the current climate change. SBTool is a sustainable building evaluation system that can be calibrated according to the region, project type and phase of development, making SBTool a tailormade assessment system for a specific project. In this study, SBTool was adapted for the first time to an educational facility in Marmara/Turkey climate. The assessment parameters and their weights are arranged according to climate zone, building type, and accommodation characteristics. The created assessment tool was applied analytically to the Engineering Faculty Building of Yalova University/Turkey as a case study. The study showed that the government-run educational facilities could be evaluated with a tool that has 7 Issues, 21 Categories and 45 Criteria after adjustments made to follow its specific regional and local conditions. The assessed building got a Weighted Score of 3.30 points compared to the Target Weighted Score established at 3.08 points. The relative performance score was assigned to “B” which means an acceptable standard for a sustainable building. The methodology of assessment is presented step by step ending up with a graphical interpretation of the evaluation.

Adoption of Green Building Assessment Systems to Existing Buildings under Kazakhstani Conditions

The construction industry is an enormous economic sector with a profound economic, social, and environmental impact. The building sector is responsible for one-third of total energy consumption and, notably, construction activities account for 39% of the total carbon emissions in the world. Therefore, nowadays, the promotion of green building concepts is essential for all countries. Typically, the sustainability level of a building is evaluated by specified certification systems through rating assessment tools. The development of national assessment tools is necessary for the developing world due to environmental, social, and economic issues; consequently, a national assessment tool adopted under specific local conditions would provide a more precise assessment. This paper analyzes the rating system of BREEAM, LEED, CASBEE, and Green Globes certification systems and discusses their adoption with assessment measures for the existing buildings in Kazakhstan’s reality. The following main criteria were discussed during six roundtable sessions: sustainable site and landscape, energy and carbon footprint reduction, water and wastewater management, indoor environmental quality, sustainable building materials, commissioning, and maintenance. A set of assessment criteria and measures were suggested, and 43 existing buildings were assessed. Only eight buildings reached a high rating level. The “sustainable site and landscape” and “indoor environmental air quality” categories were the categories with the highest scores; otherwise, “energy and carbon footprint reduction” with “water and wastewater management” had the lowest average scores. One of the buildings was evaluated separately by several experts to check the consistency of the suggested assessment measures. This evaluation also provided insight into how the assessors’ knowledge and experience may change the overall rating scores obtained. The most critical issues for the existing buildings in Kazakhstan’s reality were discussed. Despite the widespread adoption of green certification methodology, the application of global certification systems in Kazakhstan remains complicated due to the lack of knowledge and limited awareness.

Transnational common sustainability indicators for harmonising built environment assessment systems in relation to SDGs

Common Sustainability Development Goals (SDGs) have been set by the 2030 Agenda of United Nations in 2015. The European Commission committed to implement the SDGs and now Member States are preparing National Sustainable Development Strategies for contributing in the SDGs achievement. At a lower government level, regions and cities are also implementing their local strategies. Concerning the SDGs dealing with the built environment, how would it be possible to connect the global and local level strategies? To measure the progress towards SDGs and relative targets, a global framework of indicators has been set by UN. Many UN indicators have been adopted by the European Commission. The value of global indicators depends on the results achieved at local level, consequently quality and reliable local disaggregated data are necessary for the measurement of the progress towards the common goals. In the building sector, rating and assessment systems at building, urban and territorial scale can play a key role in this sense. The implementation and adoption of a core set of key performance indicators (KPIs), based on common metrics, in the existing and future assessment systems would allow to aggregate the information from the single building to the global level connecting the indicators trough the spatial scales. Common KPIs would also allow to compare the performance reached by buildings certified with different systems in relation to SDGs. The paper will illustrate the core sets of indicators elaborated and tested in 10 European countries by CESBA (Common European Sustainable Built Environment Assessment) in collaboration with iiSBE (international initiative for a Sustainable Built Environment) through two European Interreg projects at building, urban and territorial scale, in the form of a built environment Passport for the harmonization of assessment systems in relation to SDGs.

Sustainability Assessment System for Highrise Buildings in Iraq

This study aims to preparation a standards code for sustainability requirements to contribute in a better understanding to the concept of sustainability assessment systems in the dimensions of Iraqi projects in general and in the high-rise building. Iraq is one of the developing countries that faced significant challenges in sustainability aspects environmental, economic and social, it became necessary to develop an effective sustainability building assessment system in respect of the local context in Iraq. This study presented a proposal for a system of assessing the sustainability requirements of Iraqi high rise buildings (ISHTAR), which has been developed through several integrated steps, begin with investigates the well-known sustainability systems, experts consensus based on the Delphi technique involving 32 experts consider as sustainability world leading and local highly-informed to identify applicable assessment categories and factors for the Iraqi context and its weighting system, then analyze the results using the pairwise comparison and Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) technique.

Application of generalized Choquet fuzzy integral method in the sustainability rating of green buildings based on the BSAM scheme

The need to reduce the impact of building projects on the sustainability of the built environment and improve the use of resources necessitated several interventions such as the development of methods to assess building impacts and improve the sustainability performance of buildings. Using the BSAM scheme – a green building rating system developed specifically for the sub-Saharan region of Africa, the generalized Choquet fuzzy integral method was employed to determine the importance weights of the sustainability assessment criteria. Data collected from industry experts form the base inputs for the impact of the various sustainability criteria based on the local variations. Consequently, the building sustainability evaluation index and grading scheme were developed to measure and evaluate the sustainability performance of buildings. The developed sustainability rating model was validated in four real-world case studies to demonstrate its usefulness and robustness in practice. The findings revealed that the conventional approach of aggregation of points used by the existing green rating tools is less effective in dealing with criteria that have interactive characteristics. Also, assessment criteria such as sustainable construction practices, transportation, and energy have a significant impact on the sustainability of buildings. The study provides substantial contributions to the existing body of knowledge about green building assessment systems for built environment stakeholders, both from the theoretical and practical perspectives.

Modelling community electricity demand for UK and India

The energy assessment of single buildings and of larger areas of built environment, although exhibiting similarities in terms of technique, have in the past often used different approaches to energy modelling. The growing availability of empirical data and the capability of building modelling software has, more recently, allowed these differences to be reduced. This paper demonstrates, across two very different case-studies in UK and India, that techniques for community energy modelling can be used in a way that maintains detail in energy demand characteristics, thus helping to bridge the gap between detailed building assessment and higher-level energy system modelling. However, understanding the portability of such techniques requires an understanding of energy characteristics that can be specific to a geographic area. This study documents these important differences and proposes a more transferrable approach to detailed community energy modelling.

A Critical Research of Green Building Assessment Systems in Malaysia Context

Excessive development has led to main changes in world civilization, including the societal, natural environment, and economical. Construction industry is significant contributor towards numerous environmental effects. Therefore, the concept of implementation “green” has been concern. Green building has become a flagship for sustainable development that responsible for balancing long-term environmental, social health and social economic. Green building assessment systems have been introduced to evaluate the sustainability level of the green buildings such as GBI, PH JKR, GreenRE and MyCREST. Although green building assessment have been the study of many researchers over the past twenty years, it is still no systematic assessment of the detailed criteria for each assessment systems. Therefore, this research aimed to conduct critical review of green building assessment systems in Malaysia. This research is conducted through comparison analysis where the points allocated for each criteria is being measured and compared. It founds that energy efficiency criteria is the most widely used in green building assessment systems followed by water efficiency and innovations. This research showed that each green building assessment systems showed different culture and they used different criteria in evaluating the sustainability level of the green building projects. The outcomes of this research is expected to create awareness among construction industry players or decision makers to understand better and have a different perspective toward current green building assessment systems.

“Green Building”: A Step towards Environmental and Economic Construction

The purpose of this article is to provide planners with an introduction to the concept of green buildings and building assessment systems and to identify and explore the major themes in the literature as they relate to planning. Green building is one of the measures that has been put forward to alleviate the remarkable impacts of the building stock on the environment, society and economy. GRIHA (Green Rating for Integrated Habitat Assesment) is a rating instrument that helps individuals evaluate their building's efficiency against certain benchmarks that are acceptable nationwide, it evaluates a building's environmental efficiency over its entire life cycle holistically. This paper reports a critical review of the GRIHA rating system and incentives provided by GRIHA in India, techniques, and methods for construction of the green building, financial aspects of the green building. The efficiency of different environment-friendly models is broadly discussed in this study. The purpose of this paper is to explore the benefits of green building in order to proceed towards sustainable construction in the future.

A Novel framework for integrating United Nations Sustainable Development Goals into sustainable non-residential building assessment and management in Jordan

Across the world, governments have developed strategies to achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs). Sustainable buildings perform a significant function toward achieving the UN SDGs. Currently, there is a lack of information on this subject because no existing sustainable building assessment system describes the relationship between its assessment criteria and the UN SDGs. In this article, a new framework is proposed to integrate the UN SDGs into the assessment and management of sustainable non-residential buildings in Jordan. For this purpose, previous building rating systems were reviewed, and the Delphi technique was applied to identify assessment categories and indicators for sustainable non-residential buildings in Jordan. Moreover, the analytic hierarchy process and relative importance index methods were employed to develop an integrated weighting system for assessment indicators based on the significance of sustainability problems in Jordan and contributions to achieve the UN SDGs. Additionally, questionnaire surveys were conducted to construct a classification system and thereafter identify the integration of assessment indicators into project phases. Finally, the proposed framework was validated by conducting a focus group discussion. The findings in this research can potentially assist in the formulation of building assessment tools and achievement of the UN SDGs in countries, such as Jordan.

Comparison of Assessment Systems for Green Building and Green Civil Infrastructure

The assessment systems for green building have been developed and implemented for decades. Well-known systems include the U.S. system LEED, the U.K. system BREEAM, the Canadian system GB tools, and the Japanese system CASBEE. These systems will be discussed and compared together with Taiwan’s EEWH system. Each assessment system may contain a different set of evaluation items to evaluate the sustainability level of a building project. Contrarily, the assessment system for green civil infrastructure projects is rarely discussed and developed globally. In Taiwan, studies have been conducted to develop a new assessment system with some reasonable key indicators and evaluation items, serving as the tool to evaluate the sustainability level of a green civil infrastructure project. In this paper, the authors studied and summarized different key indicators and evaluation items, and made comparisons among some major assessment systems for both green building and green civil infrastructure projects. Based on the comparison of the various assessment systems, it is found that greenery, recycling of materials, water conservation, carbon emission reduction, and energy saving are considered in both green building and green civil infrastructure assessment systems. Nevertheless, external building structure, energy consumption, healthy air and temperature, illumination of the indoor environment, rainwater recycling, and underground reservoirs are considered only in green building assessments, but not in green civil infrastructure assessments. Moreover, durability, benefits, landscape, humanities, culture, and creativity, which are discussed adequately in green civil infrastructure assessments, are not highlighted in green building assessments. In addition, two construction projects in Taiwan, one green building project and one green civil infrastructure project, are presented to exemplify sustainability practices and assessments.