What’s the Difference Between Green and Sustainable Buildings?
- Environment
As conversations around climate change and sustainability have become the “in vogue” thing to talk about, the terms green and sustainable have become interchangeable.
However, in practice, they do have slightly different meanings, and where buildings are considered, apply to different scenarios relating to a building’s life cycle.
What is a sustainable building?
A sustainable building is a building that puts sustainability at the heart of every stage of its life cycle. From planning, to design and construction, operation and demolition, a sustainable building incorporates environmentally responsible and resource-efficient practices to provide a long-term comfortable, healthy and productive environment for its occupants, all whilst without negatively impacting the surrounding environment.
To examine this further, let’s look at the full journey of a building’s life cycle:
- Planning: During the planning process, the sustainable building should consider any impact on the environment, and look to preserve the surrounding environment as much as possible.
- Design: Sustainable architecture will take into account design considerations such as window placement, natural lighting and ventilation.
- Construction: The construction process should look to conserve natural resources, as well as limit energy consumption and waste to again reduce environmental impact.
- Operation and maintenance: Is energy and water being used efficiently? Building owners and occupants should aim to use renewable energy and other resources to operate as a net producer, rather than a net consumer of resources.
- Demolition: Lastly, at the end of the building’s life cycle, it’s important to dispose and handle materials in an environmentally safe manner.
What is a green building?
The key difference between sustainable buildings and green buildings is that sustainable buildings operate with all three sustainability pillars in mind (people, planet and profit), whereas green buildings focus solely on the environment.
A green building is one where that implements individual practices and processes as incremental steps towards environmental sustainability. As alluded to in the “operation and maintenance” step earlier, green initiatives can include switching to renewable energy, implementing natural ventilation systems and reducing your carbon footprint long term.
Which should I be aiming towards?
With the definitions in mind, it’s important to consider the following: Your building can be both green and sustainable, or one but not the other. By this we mean, a green building can have not been built sustainably, and a sustainable building can operate without green initiatives.
But, as we said at the start, sustainability and green initiatives have become more mainstream in recent years, especially in light of the ongoing worldwide climate crisis. It’s made green and sustainable architecture a point for concern, even for buildings that have been around for decades.
So, when thinking about how you can take advantage of the opportunities that sustainability and green initiatives bring, here are a few steps you can take.
- Reduce your energy waste: Small steps such as smart meters, switching to LED lighting, monitoring water usage and CO2 levels can make a big difference.
- Improve your building’s, and occupants’ health: You can do this with air quality monitoring, to make sure the building and your occupants are operating at their healthiest.
- Reduce your environmental impact: Solar and other forms of renewable energy can go a long way in lessening your reliance on fossil fuels.
- Get certified: The ISO 14001 Environmental Management certification can help position you as a business leading the way in environmental efficiency savings with our rigorous environmental management system standard.
Operating as a green and sustainable building benefits all parties involved. Not only are you doing your bit for the planet, but you’ll be creating an attractive space for occupants to reside, prolonging the life and health of all those involved.
Where to go for more information
This article is part of a series focused on sustainable construction and building design. You can read the others at your own leisure by clicking below, and to find out more about the ISO 14001 standard, you can read our beginner’s guide.
- Further reading: What is sustainable construction and why is it important?
- Further reading: What is sustainable building design how is it the future