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INDUSTRY VIEWFINDER
Which aspects of sustainable design are your commercial clients asking you to focus on?
measurement itself, such as within complex projects. Such rigour in both the certifi cation process and reporting of sustainability measurement is being increasingly sought by major investors in commercial projects.
JLL has produced data to show that BREEAM- accredited schemes on average have a 20% higher capital value than their counterparts. The US Green Building Council has found that LEED certifi ed buildings can produce 34% fewer CO2
80 million tonnes of waste that would go to landfi ll over their life. Clients’ reasons & ROI
Reinforcing the message of the importance of ESG for clients seeking sustainability certifi cation for projects, our results illustrated that the most-selected reason for certifi cation for clients was ESG, with 35% of respondents choosing it. The second two options were the clients’ own sustainability policies, and the clients’ carbon reduction strategies in new builds (with 25% respectively). Slightly behind these were specifi c carbon reduction aims for adaptive reuse projects, showing the sustained trend for transforming heritage and other buildings into new uses including workplaces. Certifi cation methods such as BREEAM have been hailed as important and useful means of coordinating design teams behind an often long and sometimes seemingly confl icting list of criteria. However, for our survey sample, this was low on the list of reasons for their clients, with only 5% saying that the reason for choosing certifi cation was “design coordination of sustainability aims.” Lastly, designers’ and architectural practices’ own aims to achieve such certifi cation was similarly low on the list, at just 5%. It can add signifi cant cost to a project to undertake full
certifi cation of sustainability. According to the USGBC, achieving BREEAM or LEED certifi cation represents “approximately 2% of the total construction cost.” However, different certifi cation levels have different levels of detail, so that while LEED Silver or BREEAM Good both come in at only around 0.7%, UKGBC
WWW.ARCHITECTSDATAFILE.CO.UK emissions, and save
reckons that LEED Gold or BREEAM Very Good work out around 2.2% of build cost, and LEED Platinum, BREEAM Excellent and BREEAM Outstanding are more likely to cost around 6.8% of the total build budget. We asked our respondents from their experience what extra investment is likely to be required. While most responses were unsure (32%), a relatively large number (21%) said that certifi cation could add a further 10% to project costs, meaning that it’s a considerable investment for their clients which must be recouped. According to a small majority (10%) of our cohort, certifi cation of sustainability could potentially cost below 2% of a project’s capital budget. The fi ndings of our research found that a measurable, although largely modest return on investment for pursuing sustainability certifi cation was likely for commercial clients. The majority said that only a return of between 2% and 5% has been achieved on projects, and considering that most believed that an extra 10% additional project cost could result from the approach. The average was a 3.5% return according to our cohort; clearly there will be a battle to persuade many clients that the return can justify the investment on a fi nancial asset value case alone.
Solutions
There are several established sustainability standards to choose from, depending on the nature of the project, but according to our survey cohort, the overwhelming choice currently is the widely established and comprehensive BREEAM, closely followed by the US-based standard LEED.
While BREEAM the most selected for managed offi ces, LEED was hot on its heels, equalling its total in serviced offi ces of 29% for BREEAM. While Passivhaus scored relatively low, its retrofi t equivalent EnerPhit saw an encouraging level of take up. The same number as those picking BREEAM and LEED for serviced offi ces (29%) also said they were using EnerPhit.
ADF FEBRUARY 2025
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