Why All New Buildings Should Be Eco-Friendly - Essay Example

Why All New Buildings Should Be Eco-Friendly? Introduction The challenges for building construction in the 21st century are to tackle the issues of environmental change, reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and achieving sustainability. While, technologies and techniques for designing eco-friendly structures are possible, constructing and maintaining are other issues entirely. Environmentalists and policymakers are keen on establishing sustainable built environment but for the constructors, real estate companies and owners, it is difficult to adopt sustainable initiatives due to process, costs and true benefits of the same. Besides, there is a general perception that developing eco-friendly building means disregard for aesthetic values. As a result, eco-friendly buildings are still not so widespread. In the following, the researcher will discuss arguments for and against eco-friendly buildings. It will be examined by cost efficiency, maintaining and aesthetic values. The costs of developing an eco-friendly building vary from building to building; most of them are more costly than conventional buildings. For instance, in order to minimise the effects on environment, the risk mitigation fee of eco-friendly buildings is near three times higher than it is of conventional ones, as well as the overheads during construction are up to four times more (Newell 2008). Beside these costly inputs, the chief obstacle which causes investors are costly home and commercial property integration of energy efficient technologies which do not offer returns to the investors. Obviously, the owners will save their energy fee from these technologies but the builders can only balance these inputs by selling in higher prices which may cause losing the potential customers consequently. Another problem related to cost efficiency is that the market perceives the cost of capital and construction of eco-friendly building increase significantly as standards are established. Before a new eco-friendly building could be put on the market, it has to be scrutinized by rigid criterion to be qualified as eco-friendly; this entails more money spending on building maintenance. For example, in Australia, it takes more than one year to be certified as “Green Star” which is a standard launched by Green Building Council Australia (GBCA), and about 8 percent of total financial investment have to be paid for advertising, management and equipments maintaining during this period (Newell 2008). However, in the long run, the return of eco-friendly buildings will out performs the cost invested (Kozlowski 2003 in Miller and Buys 2008). Integration of innovative and efficient energy saving technologies to support sustainable design of eco-friendly building result in low cost of energy consumption. A show case building in Australia is 39 Hunter Street. This is a heritage building built in 1916 which has been refurbished to achieve 6 Star Green Star rating. The project included total refurbishment of equipments, energy services, fittings and fixtures to reflect the standards established by the GBCA (2008). By refurbishing the building into a sustainable establishment, 39 Hunter Street is now capable of providing office space to modern organizations seamlessly and energy fees have fallen to about half of it used to be (GBCA 2008). According to the report of Energy Efficient Commercial Building published by government of South Australia, the money invested in energy saving equipments will be balanced in less than two years. Hence, the cost of efficiency of green building is inherent in its attractiveness to future investors, occupants and users. Although to achieve this purpose, the builder needs to invest before the investment gives its returns. Moreover, in Australia, the high cost of building and refurbishing old buildings to comply with sustainable requirements discourage investors but there is a solution to mediate this problem. The set up of listed property trusts which have been established to support eco-friendly is a financial solution for construction firms which face funding problems (Newell 2008). Another major concern is the rudimentary service market of maintaining eco-friendly buildings. To extend the limited life cycle of eco-friendly buildings, the maintenance should be inherent in the energy service system and consultancy services, which are, however, still underdeveloped. The key reason for this is lack of practical experience in marketplace, which results from short developing history of eco-friendly building. Compared with the number of consultancy service companies for conventional building, the eco-building consulting firm only occupy around 10 percent of building service market, whereas more than 26 percent is taken up by conventional consulting firms. In addition, the ongoing cost of maintaining eco-friendly buildings is higher than conventional buildings, especially for buildings which require maintenance of electrical equipments. As Ang and Wilkinson (2008) reported in their research paper, to maintain solar panels and air conditioning systems, it needs to be overhauled semi annually at least, which tend to increase the total cost. For these reasons, eco-friendly buildings are not preferred by owners. Despite these facts, research indicates that maintenance of new eco-friendly buildings is less costly as it is centred on its occupants. Maintenance techniques and processes for new green buildings are tailored to its operations, materials and equipments, which can be selected according to the owner’s paying capacity before constructing. As the market for eco-friendly buildings mature gradually, new guidelines are established by consulting firms or organizations to assist builders and owners to decide which eco products are the most appropriate. Therefore, consulting in advance can probably avoid money wasting caused by conventional purchase habits, such as going for latest eco equipments which normally involve high maintaining cost. Likewise, as more commercial building residents are becoming aware of the value of sustainable development, they prefer to occupy new eco-friendly buildings rather than older ones. This perception associated with sustainable development and quality lifestyle is likely to encourage the contribution towards environmentally friendly initiatives. To illustrate, the self maintaining equipments such as grey water recycling system which entered the residential building market recently in Australia is welcomed among the new owners (Bullen 2007; Ang and Wilkinson 2008). These examples demonstrate that eco-friendly buildings actually incur lower cost of maintenance if occupants contribute towards its initial cost of development. The third hindrance to eco-friendly building is the lower aesthetic value. One seldom comes across eco-friendly architecture, but just as eco-friendly building, this implies eco-friendly buildings emphasized on its environmental performance, rather than impressive appearances or structures. To be an eco-friendly building, structures have to adopt large energy efficient systems and equipments which are always exposed outside the buildings, and structures for adjustments and fixing purposes. If an owner decides to install an energy efficient insulation into the building, the structure has to endure heavy roofs and walls which are two times thicker than non-eco counterparts. Also, in order to minimize the environmental impacts during construction, one unwritten principle of eco-friendly building is that the structure should be built simpler, which result in most eco- friendly buildings appearing plain. All of these are integrated into an eco-friendly building as a compromise of aesthetic aspects. But perhaps the most important aspect of aesthetic value with regard to eco-friendly buildings is the material. Eco-materials supply is limited. Considering to be ecologically friendly and to reduce the costs, designers normally don’t have much flexible choices, especially when they are only allowed to use local materials. For example, bulk building materials for building the structure and infrastructure should be sand, stone and wood etc.(Bullen 2007; Kohler and Hassler 2002). Architects are not inspired to design some thing magnificent when they are involved in eco-building projects. However, the benefits of eco-friendly buildings outweigh its compromises. They help in creating harmony with landscape rather than deteriorate the aesthetic sense of the whole place. The ecological impact for whole environment is taken into account before its building takes place. For this reason disposal, demolition or construction of new buildings are environmentally friendly. These may include surveys of ecological sensitive areas before construction, devising solution for building wastes, or developing conservation of building resources to match the needs of its occupants in the long term (Rohracher 2001, Davies 2005). These aspects not only require minimum impacts on environment but also do not interfere with the aesthetic value of the surrounding landscape. One far-reaching case is the Fallingwater, also known as the Edgar J. Kaufmann Sr. Residence, is a house designed by American architect Frank Lloyd Wright in 1935 in rural south-western Pennsylvania, which is acknowledged as the earliest eco-friendly building. It is built on top of an active waterfall which flows beneath the house. Buy using local featured material – stone – as external structure and bold reinforced concrete as internal structure, the house integrated the striking natural surroundings perfectly within the house. TIME magazine claims it as “the most beautiful architecture”, and it is listed as a tourist attraction among Smithsonian magazine's Life List of Top 28 places to visit (Kohler and Hassler 2002). Eco-friendly building does not merely mean the use of sophisticated equipments or unembellished materials. Instead it means to gather knowledge about building stock, assessment and designing to revive existing structures and upgrade the aesthetic value of whole area. Clearly, from the above discussion, it can be understood that there is a gap between the implementation of eco-friendly building and the issues it poses to the practitioners. Three of the major concerns that impact the practitioners are the high cost and investment returns, maintenance, and aesthetic values inherent in constructing green buildings. In the course of the discussion, the researcher has come to realize that the cost issue is linked with the investment in properties which could be resolved through eco building financial aids and policies established by the government. The maintenance of eco friendly building is facing the shortage of service market and high maintenance cost, however as the development of the eco building market matures, house owners can consult before making a final decision. Thirdly, the aesthetic aspects can be addressed in terms of developing within the confines of current aesthetic landscape. In conclusion, since buildings have a significant environmental impact over their whole life cycle, it is imperative not only for governments but also for the public to promote eco-friendly building which is considered to be environmentally economical and socially beneficial. . References Ang, S. L. and Wilkinson, S. J. (2008) Is the social agenda driving sustainable property development in Melbourne, Australia? Property Management Vol. 26 No. 5, pp. 331-343 Building Commission (2003) Sustainability in the Built Environment. Building Commission [Online Available]: http://www.buildingcommission.com.au/resources/documents/Sustain.pdf Bullen, P. A. (2007) Adaptive reuse and sustainability of commercial buildings. Facilities. Vol. 25 No. 1/2, pp. 20-31 Davies, R. (2005), Green Value – Green Buildings, Growing Assets, Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, London. Dixon, T., Keeping, M. and Roberts, C. (2008) Facing the future: energy performance certificates and commercial property. Journal of Property Investment & Finance, Vol. 26 No. 1, pp. 96-100. Green Building Council Australia (2008) Kohler, N. and Hassler, U. (2002) The building stock as a research object. Building Research & Information, Volume 30, Issue 4 pp. 226 - 236 Kozlowski, D. (2003) Green gains: where sustainable design stands now, Building Operating Management, Vol. 50 No. 7, pp. 26-32. Miller, E. and Buys, L. (2008) Retrofitting commercial office buildings for sustainability: tenants’ perspectives, Journal of Property Investment & Finance Vol. 26 No. 6, pp. 552-56 Newell, G. (2008) The strategic significance of environmental sustainability by Australian-listed property trusts. Journal of Property Investment & Finance Vol. 26 No. 6, pp. 522-540 Rohracher, H. (2001) Managing the Technological Transition to Sustainable Construction of Buildings: A Socio-Technical Perspective. Technology Analysis & Strategic Management, Volume 13, Issue 1 pp. 137 - 150 Read More