The latest updates to Green Star promise to accelerate action on climate change while encouraging the industry to get serious about air-tightness testing.
The introduction of minimum point requirements for greenhouse gas emissions for 5 and 6 Star Green Star ratings is a response to the Green Building Council of Australia's (GBCA) new strategic direction, and its new goal to drive a carbon positive industry.
GBCA's head of market transformation, Jorge Chapa, said the council is reprioritising carbon as a key environmental issue that industry must address – and setting minimum requirements is an important part of making it happen.
Under the proposed changes, a building project seeking 5 Star Green Star certification would be required to achieve three Green Star points in the ‘Greenhouse Gas Emissions’ credit, and be 25 per cent more efficient than a benchmark building.
A 6 Star Green Star building would be required to achieve six points and demonstrate efficiency of almost 40 per cent above the benchmark. The improvements would be addressed through energy efficiency or onsite renewables.
“This measure would enable us to provide clearer differentiation between the star ratings, and to guarantee, as a minimum, that a 5 Star building would produce fewer greenhouse gas emissions than a 4 Star building, and so on,” Chapa said.
“And any project team wanting to achieve 6 Star Green Star ‘world leadership’ in sustainable design and construction would be required to demonstrate they are well on their way to world leadership in greenhouse gas mitigation.”
Chapa said minimum requirements are part of a broader plan to align Green Star with the distinct trajectories outlined in the Paris Agreement.
“We are currently working on a project that will outline our expectations for these trajectories and how industry can work towards them. It’s the roadmap that industry has been asking for.”
A proposed change to the ‘Commissioning and Tuning’ credit would simultaneously drive the uptake of air-tightness testing.
Under the revised credit, project teams would be required to undertake testing to demonstrate that the façade air tightness specifications had been achieved.
“This isn’t about setting a standard for air-tightness yet, though this allows us to push Australia to take air-tightness seriously,” he said.
“This first step is about building industry capacity and educating project teams on the value of air-tightness testing.
“If this goes ahead, the GBCA will analyse and share the information gathered from the credit to better understand where Australian buildings are landing, so we can all take actions to ensure air-tightness testing and standards respond to Australia’s unique climate conditions.”
While there are other small changes to Green Star, Chapa said both of these developments will have positive impacts on the industry.
Consultation on the updates to Green Star are now closed, but Chapa said industry feedback has been “overwhelmingly positive”.
“Together, we can create healthy, resilient and positive places for people and the natural environment,” he said.