Management and communication of HVAC-specific life cycle-related information - filling the gaps for sustainability assessment of buildings

Assessing the contribution of buildings to sustainable development is no longer just a matter of scientific investigation. Increasingly, such considerations are becoming a prerequisite for the award of subsidies or the fulfillment of legal requirements. One aspect is the evaluation of the environmental performance, based on a life cycle assessment of the complete building in its life cycle. This requires corresponding data on all installed products (materials, components, systems) on a consistent methodological basis and suitable communication forms. To that, information is required on technical characteristics and the life cycle assessment results of construction products. Thereby the following problems are occurring: (1) there are not enough environmental product declarations according to EN 15804 A2 available in the field of building services systems (e.g. HVAC) and (2) the data contained in EPDs do not fully cover the information needs of designers and decision-makers. This complicates the work of involved actors and endangers the competitiveness of product suppliers. In response, a proposal for a product information system for building services is presented. It is adapted to the specifics of HVAC systems and the information needs of related actors. The background is the situation in Germany, but results can be transferred to other countries / markets

New building portfolio – assessment model for sustainable and future-proof company-owned building stocks

An essential task for residential property companies to maintain their long-term viability is to secure the future rentability/marketability of their buildings. On top of that, they should also be willing to take on more responsibility for the environment and society to contribute to sustainable development. Both tasks are closely interlinked. The question that arises is how and with which tools residential property companies should control the further development of their building stocks in order to meet these requirements. Residential property companies use tools for the analysis and management of their existing building portfolio. Models that link location characteristics and building performance with rental success provide one approach. In the context of using methodological approaches such as cause-effect relationships, scoring methods and regression analysis, the paper discusses how dependencies between megatrends, rental success, location characteristic and property performance can be better modelled. The paper also attempts to introduce additional indicators that are directly related to sustainable development objectives. The result is a concept that supports the advancement of portfolio analysis methods, which both integrates additional sustainability aspects and takes into account a dynamically changing environment (shift in values towards sustainability, political framework conditions, climate change). In particular, the paper presents the interdependencies between external environment and location / building on the one hand, and location and building on the other. By modelling the correlation between the impact of the respective megatrend and the underlying portfolio assessment, the model can support portfolio managers of residential property companies in their work. Results can serve as an early warning indicator and form the basis for recommendations for action regarding the portfolio strategy

Building passports and material inventories – concepts, trends, job sharing

The real estate industry is motivated to contribute to a more sustainable built environment. To meet future sustainability goals, building owners and other decision makers rely on high-quality building-related data. On the one hand, possibilities to collect, access and exchange data improve constantly due to developments in information technology. On the other hand, the task to manage data as a growing and versatile resource becomes more difficult. To overcome resulting challenges, the use of building passports, that can serve as a life cycle data repository for single buildings, can be very useful. The importance of building passports is more and more recognised within the industry, but there is an ongoing discussion about their original function. For this reason, the contribution firstly explains the origins of building passports and how the concept has evolved over time. Furthermore, the following research questions are addressed: (1) What are the main goals, functions and requirements of building passports? (2) Which current developments are related to building passports and how do specific concepts differ? (3) How can a job-sharing with other instruments like material passports be realised and what are the benefits? The research focuses on the situation in Germany considering developments on EU level

(Net-) zero-emission buildings: a typology of terms and definitions

Several different definitions of ‘net-zero’ or ‘climate-neutral’ buildings have arisen and are causing confusion. Different approaches quantify the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of buildings over their life-cycle. A typology is proposed based on distinctions between absolute and net-zero-emission buildings in relation to operational and full life-cycle approaches. Besides the absolute zero-emission approach, three different net-zero-emission approaches are: (1) a net-balance approach, which includes credits caused by potentially avoided emissions beyond the system boundary provided by exported energy; (2) an offsetting approach, based on the purchase of CO2 certificates; and (3) a technical approach, based on negative-emission technologies. The declaration of the approach chosen will provide clarity when discussing (net/absolute)-zero emission or climate-neutral buildings

Information management throughout the life cycle of buildings - Basics and new approaches such as blockchain

Ensuring sustainability for real estate is subject - among other aspects - to building related information. This information needs to be stored and updated continuously throughout the life cycle of a building. A delivery to buyers, tenants, consultants or other actors must be possible at any time. However, in most cases transactions cause significant loss of information while the issues associated with the "building passport" approach remains unsolved to date. Considering the long service life of buildings, various questions arise: (1) How to support data generation and storage within the life cycle and how to encourage actors to compete? (2) How to assure a high data quality and how to store it over a long period of time? (3) How to assure that all data users can track down the data owners at any point of time to manage compliance and legal issues? (4) Are there any new business models or new scopes for designers or other service providers? Information needs of actors along the life cycle are analysed and new information technologies (e.g. blockchain) are discussed. A relation to Building Information Modeling (BIM) is shown. Potentials of enhancing existing approaches regarding documentation retracing and accessibility of building and life cycle related information by using new technologies and IT are discussed; benefits of using a blockchain based system is pointed out by referring to existing pilot projects and first examples. Solution approaches for building passports are shown