13^th March & 20^th March, 2022, Sunday

12 noon-1pm

• The building sector in India is growing at a rapid pace and contributing immensely to the growth of the economy. In the last 10 years in any city, there has been immense growth in the building sector. The resources used, materials used and measures to control environment are not being used to the mark. 
• Green building concept was introduced in India long back. It can have many benefits, both tangible and intangible. 
• Most tangible benefits are reduction in water and energy consumption.
• If green building norms are followed, energy saving ranges from 20-30%. Water saving is 30-50%.
• Intangible benefits in green building include enhanced air quality, excellent day light, health and wellbeing of occupants, safety benefits, conservation of sparse natural resources.

• There are different rating systems for green buildings; in the US it is LEED, NAHB; in Australia it is NABARS green star and in UK, it is BREEAM. In India, there are LEED India and TERI GRIHA.
• Most prevalent rating system in India is GRIHA (Green Rating for Integrated Habitat Assessment) rating system developed by TERI and Ministry of Renewable Energy.
• LEED India is an Indian adaptation of LEED USA by Indian Green Building Council.
• Each rating system is divided into different levels of certification; silver to recognize outstanding performances; gold to recognize national excellence and platinum to recognize global leadership.
• In different levels of green building certification, various levels are certified to recognize best practices 30-36 points; silver 37-44 points; gold 45-55 points and platinum 56-75 points.
• IGBC green buildings address green features in different categories: Site selection and planning, water conservation, energy conservation, materials conservation, indoor environmental quality and occupational health and innovation & design process.
• TERI has the most important GRIHA green rating for integrated habitat assessment.
• GRIHA rating consists of 34 criteria under various sections like site selection, site planning, conservation and efficient utilization of resources, building operation and maintenance and innovation points. Eight of these 34 criteria are mandatory, 4 are partly mandatory, rest are optional. Each criterion has a number of points attached to it. This means that a project meeting the criteria would qualify for the points.
• There are different levels of certification – one star to five stars are awarded on the basis of number The rating systems of certification address the most important national priority, which include water conservation, waste handling, reduced use of fossil fuel, lesser dependence on use of virgin material.

• Rating systems also require application of National standards and codes such as the NBC, ECBC, MoEF guidelines, CPCB and SPCB guidelines.
• For government buildings, the 3-star GRIHA rating is mandatory.
• For private buildings, there are different incentives given by the Government, particularly the state Government. The Floor Area Ratio (FAR) of the building have 5%, some have 7%.
• Instead of FAR, incentive should be on house tax or it can be a combination of incentives.
• For certification, the project must satisfy all requirements and minimum number of credit points.
• We have to learn a lot about traditional practices for green buildings. Modern architectural education has not given attention to traditional practices. 
• Green building starts with vastu, which is efficient and effective utilization of natural resources. Our wind pattern is almost fixed throughout the year. This should be put to use. Sun rotational path is also uniform. Sunlight is the biggest disinfectant. Morning sun will disinfect. 
• South facing house is always breezy and ventilation will also dilute the pollution. Natural ventilation is the most important criterion for indoor air quality. 
• Building materials such as bricks, reinforcement material, glazing system, painting material, roof designing, height is also very important.
• Green building in modern term is called low carbon building.
• The architects and builders have to learn the importance of solar lighting, ventilation, energy saving. If architects do not give importance to these things, things will not improve. Environmentalists can draw attention to these problems, the architects have to practice it more.
• In unorganized colonies no importance is given to ventilation, light. In many societies, balconies are closed. Regulators in municipal corporations should stop the encroachment in buildings.

• The objectives of green building are firstly to minimize impact on natural environment, second to reduce energy uses and water uses, third healthy system, the building will protect the occupants’ health and increase productivity. Green building is designed and constructed in such a manner that it minimizes waste, pollution and environmental degradation. These are the benefits of concept of green building.
• Features of green building are structure design efficiency, water efficiency, energy efficiency, material efficiency and waste and toxic reductions. 
• In structure efficiency, the main intention is to minimize the total environmental impact associated with all life cycles. It has the largest impact on cost and performance of building.
• In energy efficiency, the strategy is to reduce the operating energy use and renewable energy through solar power, wind power, hydro power, wind power and biomass can significantly reduce the environmental impact.
• In water efficiency, this involves reducing water consumption and protecting water quality; the use of non-sewage and grey water for onsite use such as site irrigation will minimize the demand on local aquifer. 
• In material efficiency,  building material should be renewable material and friendly to environment e.g., lumbar from forests, renewable plant materials like bamboo, straw and other products that are non-toxic and reusable.
• Waste and toxic reduction - to reuse resources and to recycle resources.
• The objective of green building rating system is to evaluate the performance of green building.

• The performance is evaluated based on some parameters like site planning, building envelope design and building system design (HBAC), integration of renewable energy sources to generate energy on site, planning designing, construction and operation.
• Fundamental principles of green building are sustainable site design, indoor environmental quality, energy and environment material and resources, water quality and conservation.
• In sustainable site design, evaluate each site in terms of orientation and location of building in order to optimize the use of passive solar energy, natural day lighting, natural breezes and ventilation. This helps to reduce the urban heat island effect by maximizing the use of premium services and using light colored roofs; paving and roof gardens provide natural shading to buildings and paved areas with trees and other landscape features have produced night time light pollution by avoiding over illumination of the site.
• Rain water harvesting is very important. 
• In rural areas, the houses were made of mud with straw. They did not have very long durability but every year they put a layer of mud on the house, which kept the house cool in summer and hot in winter. It worked as natural insulation. We can adopt some of these practices.
• If we use bricks, we are using up our top soil, this will reduce agricultural fertility leading to food shortages in the future.
• The government has to think how to build houses without using bricks, concrete.
• Not much research is being done on traditional practices. There is a need for integration of traditional practices with modern knowledge.
• There are grading systems, but the weightage is also important. It has been divided into six categories. Maximum weightage 35% is on energy efficiency. More focus on solar lighting – natural lighting. It is possible only with natural ventilation; 15% water, 15% on sustainable site planning, 15% on health and wellbeing. Rest is on 20% material resources and solid waste management 6% - this area needs more weightage.
• Green building concept starts with site planning. 
• Every major building has 100 battery storage for stand by power. They have a maximum life of five years. Their disposal has to be worked out. 
• There should be separate water meters, rainwater harvesting should be implemented properly and plumbing in houses should be dual, one for freshwater and the other for treated water.
• For ventilation, reverse air suction system is also important for green building.
• These recommendations might be difficult for a house owner to implement. But, if an architect/builder gives a compliance certificate or report that they have followed all the guidelines in making the building, this can be a good beginning. Architects will also be conscious that they have to submit compliance report to the house owner. In fact, each house owner should be given a booklet before starting the work about the requirements or guidelines for green building.
• Orientation of the building should be planned in such a way that it allows natural light and ventilation; this way energy consumption reduces automatically.
• Buildings of 20,000 sq m built up area should mandatory be only green buildings. For three- or four-star buildings with 10,000 to 20,000 sq m built up area, some points can be mandatory and some can be voluntary; for those less than 10,000, it should be voluntary with direct immediate incentives like house tax.
• Earlier, all houses had reflective white color on outside. Nowadays, the building exterior is painted in colors other than white.
• Service level benchmarking has already been notified by the Ministry of urban development. These have to be enforced. 
• We have to look into the lifecycle analysis of the products that are used in construction rather than initial cost alone whether it is private or government.
• Awareness programs for engineers and architects are necessary.
• If there is proper implementation of rules, then every building will qualify for green building.
• Rainwater harvesting is compulsory in Delhi in plots of size greater than 100 m2. A proper monitoring system is a must for rain water harvesting to be successful. If rain water harvesting system is not cleaned pre or post monsoon, it will not work well.
• Materials that reduce noise should be used for construction. In olden times, acoustic materials were used like floors were made of chuna; granite was used less. Granite/marble produce echo.
• Reusing materials or use of recycled materials will reduce consumption of virgin materials. Keeping in mind the emissions, we should be careful about transportation, that the materials come from a range of 300 to 400 km so that transport cost is low.
• High performance green buildings will use less operating energy. Embodied energy has assumed greater importance and may make up as much as 30% of lifecycle of energy consumption.
• To reduce operating energy, air leakage through the building envelope is reduced with extra insulation in floor, ceilings and walls.
• Effective window placement can provide more natural light.
• Windows, awnings, porches are oriented to shade windows and roofs during the summer, while maximizing the solar gain in winter.
• Building materials which can be considered green include lumbar from forests, rapidly renewable plant materials such as bamboo, straw, recycled stone, recycled metal and other products that are non-toxic, renewable, reusable and recyclable.

Participants

Dr Anil Kumar

Mr Vivek Kumar

Mr Paritosh Tyagi

Dr SK Gupta

Dr Dipankar Saha

Dr M Dwarakanath

Mr Ashu

Mr Rajeev SHarma

Mr Neeraj Tyagi

Mr Ankit Sethi

Mr Varun Singh

Mr Pradeep Khandelwal