DGBC English
Introduction
The Dutch Green Building Council (DGBC) was founded in 2007 in The Netherlands as a market initiative. The aim was to make Sustainability in the building industry measurable by developing a sustainability label allowing for the uniform rating of buildings throughout the Netherlands.
The initiative came from the building industry itself. The industry felt a strong need for promoting the concept of sustainability quantification and assessing buildings unequivocally in a manner that is accepted internationally. The original five ’Founding Partners’ have already been joined by more than 200 other ‘Participants’ representing almost all industry sectors. And since the first label for New Buildings has become operational on the first of October 2009, this number is still growing consistently.
Need for CO2 reduction
From construction to daily operation, buildings in Europe are responsible for almost 40% of the continent’s CO2 emissions. With this in mind, the DGBC was formed to meet the growing demand for sustainable development from occupiers, investors and developers alike within the real estate industry. The council’s mission is to drastically improve sustainability levels in the built environment, working towards climate neutral buildings that are both pleasant and healthy to work in, and win back the Dutch leading position in the area of sustainability.
The choice for BREEAM
After consulting the participants regarding their criteria on a practical sustainable certification DGBC concluded they were looking for a system that provides international comparability, is adaptable to the local situation and standards (climate, building regulations, etc), is open and transparent, allows for a good balance between price and quality and provides for independent assessments. Having examined various international options for benchmarking buildings, the DGBC choose to use the English BREEAM methodology as the basis for their sustainability label.
The ‘Environmental Assessment Method’ of buildings was originally developed by the Building Research Establishment (BRE), a British research organization, hence the name BREEAM. BRE has had more than 100,000 buildings certified and operates in 15 different countries.
From Pass to Outstanding
BREEAM has nine categories:
1. Management
2. Health and Wellbeing
3. Energy
4. Transport
5. Water
6. Materials
7. Waste
8. Land use & Ecology
9. Pollution
Scores can be obtained per category and through qualitative weighting a total score is obtained. Within bandwidths the total score of the examined building receives a qualification on the certificate: Pass, Good, Very Good, Excellent or Outstanding.
BREEAM-NL
The DGBC translated the original English version into Dutch. In April 2008, the council worked out the first adaptation of BREEAM-NL New Buildings to the local situation in the Netherlands. Five working groups comprised of retail, residential, office, industrial and regional constituents offered their feedback in May, and this input was used to form an optimal rating scheme for each building type and region. The next step was to implement what the Dutch GBC had learned.
13 Pilot projects commenced in February 2009. In March 2009 DGBC launched the beta version of BREEAM-NL New Buildings. The addition ‘NL’ makes clear that this is the Dutch version.
The beta version was designed to be used for testing. Besides the thirteen official pilots many other organizations and individuals downloaded and tried the beta version. A dedicated Wikipedia page was opened to allow for anyone to assist in the development. Their findings, comments and questions contributed to the completion of BREEAM-NL.
In September 2009, the council formally approved BREEAM-NL 2010 Version 1.0 for new buildings. This scheme can be used for individual offices, schools, shops, industrial buildings and major renovation projects. On October first, the scheme was publicly launched.
The council will further develop the In Use- and Area Development-labels.
Adding value
Evidence indicates that sustainable buildings have lower vacancy rates, higher rents, and increased property values. Yet to accurately assess the added value of sustainable investments a uniform measuring stick is needed. Environmental rating systems not only provide this standardized basis for comparison between different buildings in different regions, but they add additional value to the sustainable design and operation of these buildings.
A DGBC board member: “Buildings with the BREEAM-NL label are from now on guaranteed with a higher return on investment in comparison to non-sustainable buildings. The new label is a feature for new buildings that exceed the current Dutch national regulations in terms of sustainability. Public and private parties that do more than is legally required, will be highlighted using BREEAM-NL in comparison to other parties that merely apply generally accepted rules”.
Goals
The DGBC’s overarching goal is to advance the sustainability level of the built environment. In practice this leads to four primary goals. The first goal is to allow for the accurate and consistent measurement of a building’s sustainability level. The second goal is to raise the profile of sustainable buildings. The DGBC has already trained some 60 assessors and 230 experts to certify buildings. The third goal is to expand and share knowledge. Sharing knowledge within the industry is vital to obtaining smooth and rapid progress, and the DGBC organises numerous conferences and events related to sustainable buildings and regional development. In addition DGBC cooperates with universities and professional development institutions, and is involved in making educational material for high schools. The fourth goal is to ensure that sustainable construction becomes common practice and to fully integrate sustainability issues from planning through development and into final use. To guarantee sustainable use, it is necessary that occupiers change their habits, so the DGBC wants to study how buildings are being used and what actions should be taken to improve on this.
International
The DGBC is a member of the World Green Building Council, which stimulates knowledge sharing between councils and sets the standard for high quality local councils. In turn the DGBC also supports other Green Building Councils. In Belgium, the DGBC has brought together a number of interested parties to start their own council. Once this initiative gets off the ground, DGBC will assist and support them with translating BREEAM for Belgian use. DGBC is also in contact with the Romanian, Polish, South African, Swedish and German councils.
