On a typically hot and humid afternoon in Singapore, a fresh breeze blows beneath the canopy of the South Beach development, keeping temperatures several degrees cooler than on the surrounding streets.
The rippling 280m wave of steel-and-aluminum runs the length of the Norman Foster-designed complex, funneling prevailing winds over outdoor patrons of restaurants and bars and saving on air conditioning for the mixed-use complex. The canopy is covered with solar panels and catches rainwater to irrigate the gardens.
Offices and apartment blocks designed to be green are springing up all over the world as architects reverse almost a century of trying to insulate workers from nature and instead try to adapt structures to their natural surroundings. The change is being driven by stricter building codes, a desire to cut energy costs and, in particular, demands from corporations and start-ups that need to show shareholders and customers they are meeting environmental standards.
Photo: Bloomberg
“There’s a growing shift toward including the green credentials of a building within what constitutes competitive advantage for a developer,” said Gabriel Wilson-Otto, global head of sustainability research at BNP Paribas Asset Management in Hong Kong.
Regulators are also driving change because energy-efficient buildings are “very effective” at decarbonizing cities, he said.
Commercial and residential buildings account for about 12 percent of greenhouse gas emissions globally, the European Environment Agency has said.
Photo: Bloomberg
A review of 70 studies by researchers at Finland’s Aalto University showed that green building cuts operating expenses, raises rental income and increases the capital value of properties.
However, the tropics present a unique set of challenges and opportunities for architects, from heat and humidity to intense downpours, and in some areas, violent storms. Solving those issues is critical to reining in global warming.
By 2050, the Paris Agreement deadline for the world to become carbon neutral, half the world’s population would live in the tropical belt, up from 40 percent now.
“Buildings in Asia often account for a higher percentage of greenhouse gas emissions than the worldwide average,” said Philippe Delorme, executive vice president for energy management at Schneider Electric SE.
Singapore, just one degree north of the equator, has seen a plethora of green buildings since the government launched its voluntary Green Mark Certification Scheme in 2005. South Beach, built by City Developments Ltd, is rated platinum under the system, meaning it can achieve more than 30 percent energy savings compared with a traditional building.
“Energy efficiency is a no-brainer in a tropical city like Singapore. Green building helps bring back return on investment,” said Esther An, chief sustainability officer at City Developments, ranked as Asia’s most sustainable property developer this year by Corporate Knights Inc.
However, cost saving are not the only driver. Developers are facing increasing demand from companies and start-ups that want to burnish their green credentials. Those looking for the highest certifications include multi-nationals that need to report environmental, social and corporate governance standards to shareholders and data centers keen to cut operating costs, said Tim Lo, head of system development at BEAM Society, a certification system in Hong Kong.
“Shopping centers, large or small, are also jumping on the bandwagon for green buildings, because the shoppers want a healthier space,” Lo said.
In Hong Kong, office buildings with the highest credentials get a 37 percent premium in rent compared with non-green rated buildings, said Roddy Allan, chief research officer for Asia Pacific at Jones Lang LaSalle.
Meeting the highest standards involves a lot more than adding solar panels. Using cement and materials that generate less carbon dioxide during production, vegetation and geometry that deflects the sun’s rays are among dozens of technologies employed to reduce the carbon footprint and running costs of a structure. To attract top-end tenants, companies often employ world-renowned architects to ensure buildings also offer status as well as sustainability.
For tropical cities, a key metric is to build structures that not only look cool, but are cool. As the global temperature rises, keeping the heat down in the tropics has inspired a number of innovative technologies, from Rio de Janeiro’s Museum of Tomorrow, which utilizes cold water from the bottom of neighboring Guanabara Bay, to the hanging gardens of Singapore’s ParkRoyal hotel and the angled shading of the Suruhanjaya Tenaga Diamond Building in Malaysia.
The need to integrate those new systems into buildings is prompting tie-ups and mergers between technology firms, construction companies and city governments. One trend especially popular in big Chinese cities such as Beijing and Shanghai, is to integrate solar panels into the fabric of new buildings.
Sustainable developments offer property companies another increasingly important resource — a bigger financing pool. Real estate has been a driving force in the fast-expanding debt market, with Fannie Mae in the US one of the biggest issuers. City Developments issued Singapore’s first green note in 2017, while CapitaLand Ltd followed last year.
For many tenants and builders, the main obstacle is the initial construction cost.
In the 2018 World Green Building Trends survey, almost half the respondents cited cost as the top obstacle, followed by lack of political support or incentives, a lack of public awareness and a perception that green construction is only for high-end projects.
In Southeast Asia, the number of green-certified buildings rose rapidly in the early 2000s, but then dropped off sharply after the 2007-2008 global financial crisis, Delorme said.
“While we are seeing more Asian developers building energy-efficient buildings, progress remains slow,” he said.
Instead, many firms have resorted to upgrading older buildings. Retrofitting systems could cut energy costs by 15 percent to 35 percent depending on the level of investment, a study by the Urban Land Institute and others showed.
Yet as regulations become tougher and more tenants demand the highest levels of environmental construction, greenfield developments would increasingly need to become green developments.
“There’s a clear environmental benefit to building green but investing in green building also means significant operating cost savings, shorter payback periods and an overall increase in the value of these assets,” said Melissa Baker, senior vice president of LEED technical development at the US Green Building Council. “Developers that are not building green may find themselves at a disadvantage.”
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”