How sustainable buildings are shaping cities for the future

What are the benefits of energy efficient and sustainable buildings to cities and businesses of the future?

Whether in Europe, North America, Asia, Latin America or Australia, cities are typically stressed by population, energy, water and resource issues, as well as mobility, housing, food production (and shortage) and waste issues. As populations continue to grow, we’ll continue to face challenges in the future.

Recognising that these issues are ongoing, all cities have an opportunity and an environmental responsibility to develop and operate buildings that are energy efficient and sustainable, and that use less energy and water and reduce waste – a bid to reduce their carbon footprint and to alleviate some major environmental tensions.

Energy efficient buildings are a way to ensure sustainable cities support the future. These buildings can be designed to generate their own energy, produce their own food, and can support better health and wellbeing for their occupants by enabling access to natural light and ventilation and using efficient appliances and smart technology.

Buildings that are designed to increase health and wellness can also improve business operations. Better health and wellbeing of occupants in office buildings is known to improve productivity, and, as a benefit, supports the drive to build and operate more green buildings.

You teach students about retrofitting existing buildings. Why is this so important?

For rapidly expanding cities, new building occurs due to the need for new infrastructure and the absence of appropriate building stock, but in places where cities are growing at a slower but steadier pace, and where land space is at a premium, new developments occur less often and renovations are made to existing developments. This is retrofitting.

For example, in some cities like Helsinki, where population growth is low or negligible, old building stock can be reused or repurposed for current market demands. If the building stock is of reasonable quality, then it is a waste to demolish and rebuild – demolishing uses energy, and the recovered post-demolition materials can’t always be re-used, so it’s preferable to retrofit existing buildings.

There is a growing move towards refurbishing buildings to make them futureproof.

Retrofitted buildings use less energy, less water and reduce emissions during operation.

If an extensive renovation of the building is not needed, replacing inefficient appliances with newer, more contemporary appliances can have a positive impact upon a building’s power usage.  

This article is Part One of a three-part series on sustainable cities. Sign up to receive the next piece by email.

How do efficient buildings provide better social and financial returns?

Green buildings are generally well designed, bringing in natural light and increasing the thermal comfort of occupants. They use fewer resources in building and are energy and water efficient in operation, which benefits the bottom line by being less costly to operate.

Natural light in buildings reduces the need to use artificial lighting, which has the benefit of making people feel better psychologically and connected to the outside. For businesses, this has the financial impact of improving employees’ productivity.

Well designed green buildings may also have areas where occupants can congregate socially, or may be designed such that social interactions between occupants are encouraged. This can increase knowledge sharing and employee wellbeing.

When plants are used to bring the outside world into buildings, it has been known to make occupants feel better about themselves. Better wellbeing promotes better health and productivity, which in turn increases profits for business.

Essentially, by going green in the workplace, businesses can boost financial returns by remedying inefficiencies and increasing employee morale.

How has the shift to building efficiently with environmental considerations influenced the way built environment professionals work?

The dominant focus of built environment professionals has typically been in the design and construction phase of the building’s life cycle, rather than the operational phase, until recently.

There is an increasing focus now on integrated design teams who work together from the commencement of the concept design – with all the key built environment professionals involved in the process of design, construction and operation so there is shared ownership of the final product and the environmental footprint of the building can be considered throughout the life cycle.

Shared ownership enables better understanding and sharing of information so that there are little or no disconnects between design, construction and operation, and less time is spent on tinkering and wasting valuable resources.

Getting it right the first time also provides an opportunity for other stakeholders in the industry to learn from the experience and not repeat common mistakes.

How does building efficiency impact climate change?

Climate change has now been acknowledged as the result of human activities.

The use of raw materials and other resources such as energy and water not only reduces the supply of valuable resources but also impacts attendant waste and emissions to air, water and land.

Better buildings use fewer resources and therefore touch the earth lightly.

If buildings are well designed to achieve net zero energy use and emissions, the impact of buildings on overall emissions is reduced, thereby also reducing or even eliminating the impact of climate change in the future.

About the expert: Associate Professor Usha Iyer-Raniga is an expert in sustainability in the built environment and teaches within RMIT's School of Property, Contruction and Project Management.

Story: Courtney Johnson

This article is Part One of a three-part series on sustainable cities. Sign up to receive the next piece by email.