ROUNDTABLE | Construction
Hosted by Zumtobel Light Centre Dubai, the Roundtable featured • Saeed Alabbar Vice Chairman Emirates Green Building Council • Thomas Bohlen Chief Technical Officer Middle East Centre for Sustainable Development • Monica Palmer Architect Woods Bagot • Ghadi Abou Zeid Business Development Manager Zumtobel
Moving forward by revising the past The UAE is on one hand decreed as having the highest carbon footprint in the world, and on the other, emerging as a building and sustainable practices leader in the region. Speaking with industry experts at a roundtable, BGreen explores how the nation can sustain its shift toward green architecture and design BGreen: Where does the UAE stand now in terms of sustainable architecture? Thomas Bohlen: In terms of sustainable buildings, the UAE has made a lot of progress since around 2008, when His Highness Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum announced his decree that all buildings in Dubai need to be green. I know from the LEED standpoint that there are at least 100 green buildings being constructed right now in the UAE.
“Sustainability is about acting along the way, from the early stages of product development to the end of the lifecycle”
www.buildgreen.ae
Saeed Alabbar: Trakhees regulates anything within the realm of the Dubai Municipality, and in Abu Dhabi we have the Estidama requirements that monitor whether sustainable architectural and building practices are adhered to. By standardising the requirements across the nation, the often neglected northern emirates can implement sustainable building practices.
BGreen: How do existing buildings measure up compared to new green buildings? TB: There are a lot of buildings from the last few years that were not built sustainably. In terms of insulation, meeting fresh air requirements and glazing, these buildings are definitely not up to par in terms of U-values and shading coefficients. A lot of buildings
still don’t have a management system for their HVAC system, and the ones that do aren’t well-managed. Monica Palmer: The focus should perhaps shift to refurbishing and revamping the existing buildings, because if you compare what has been built and what will be built, there is a lot of room for improvement. About three years ago, there were only a couple of buildings that were deemed green, and now nearly all the new projects are moving in that direction. Ghadi Abou Zeid: If you take the case of refurbishing a building, you might retrofit an energy efficient light solution, and also include controls, like daylight harvesting and motion harvesting et cetera. SA: New buildings, regardless of how green they may be, make up a very small fraction of the nation’s total building stock. Secondly, the notion of certifying
March 2012
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