Sustainable buildings have hit a milestone with the New Zealand Green Building Council (NZGBC) awarding its 300th Green Star certification for new buildings and fitouts.
Since it was introduced in Aotearoa in 2007, Green Star has been used by businesses, developers, architects and project teams to deliver lower carbon, more sustainable buildings. So far almost 1.5million square metres of property has been certified.
“Our city skylines are increasingly dotted with Green Star buildings. We’ve had churches, hospitals, supermarkets, warehouses, schools, convention centres, hotels, libraries, even a theatre, all showcasing their efforts to reduce their footprint through the Green Star standard,” says NZGBC chief executive Andrew Eagles.
Green Star certification provides a framework and benchmarks for projects to reduce their impact on the environment through carbon emission reductions and energy efficiency improvements, and provides incentives to building productive, healthier spaces for occupants.
“As uptake has grown, the industry has transformed to adopt more sustainable practices. We’ve seen real, measurable actions like waste diversion away from landfill increasingly taken up on site, allowing businesses to grow and facilities to expand. We’ve been able to ramp up the standard, continuing to push the industry further to measure and reduce their impact as capability has grown.”
In August the New Zealand Green Building Council is launching the next iteration of the Green Star tool – called Green Star Buildings NZ. It follows more than two years of consultation with industry and further defines what it means to create a ‘green’ building, with a greater focus on net zero ready including reducing carbon, improving biodiversity and greater social outcomes.
“We’re tremendously grateful to our growing community of green building champions who have not only ensured Green Star is recognised as a mark of quality and climate action, but who have helped embed more sustainable design, construction, and thinking into our built environment generally,” says Andrew Eagles.
A further 180 projects are registered and targeting Green Star certification in the coming years.
As well as the 300 Green Star certifications for new builds and fitouts, Green Star Performance has been used to benchmark the operation of over 60 existing buildings, and 8 community precincts including retirement villages are using Green Star Communities
Key stats for Green Star
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The 300 certifications represent approximately 240 unique buildings (projects can receive multiple ratings with separate design and built certifications, as well as Green Star Interiors ratings for fitouts.)
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The certifications represent over 140 building owners.
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Ratings include 36 - 6 star ratings, 166 - 5 star ratings, and 98 - 4 star ratings.
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The ratings are spread across Aotearoa with the largest pockets in the main centres: 181 certifications are in Auckland, 42 in Wellington, 38 Christchurch, 7 Hamilton, 3 Dunedin, with the rest throughout the regions.