Should Developing Countries worry about Green Building?
By Maery Mungati
More often than not these days, when listening to members of the construction world talk, you will hear phrases connected to green building, sustainable development and the like thrown around. Increasingly this, too, is coming into Africa. Have we reached the point of development whereby our carbon footprint, materials that we use for construction and the like matter that much to the environment that we live in to an extent where this should affect our methods, materials and even the legislature? 
It is a huge debate; at the G-8 summit the third world countries (Africa is made up of at least 75 percent developing countries) were unwilling to agree to cut down on their greenhouse gas emissions claiming that the wealthy countries were not doing enough to cut down their fast spreading pollution.
Have the developing countries reached a point whereby we should now consider the environmental damage created in our countries as a whole lot more than the dangers deforestation causes? Before that question can even be tackled we must first of all understand what green building, sustainable construction or whatever name it goes by in your part of the world, pertains to.
The concept of a green building was developed in the 1970s in response to the energy crisis and people's growing concerns about the environment. The need to save energy and mitigate environmental problems fostered a wave of green building innovation that has continued to this day.
What Exactly is Green Building?
Green buildings, sustainable buildings, eco-homes are terms that are commonly used but they are not easily defined. It is however, widely agreed that these are buildings that are designed and constructed to high environmental standards. They are sited, designed and built to energy efficient guidelines. There are four categories that can be used to describe the fundamentals of green building and these are energy, water, materials and health.
Energy
With increasing energy costs, buildings that reduce on energy both operation and consumption costs are leaning towards green. A green building tries to minimise on energy needed for the building. Energy minimising methods amongst others include the maximising of the use of natural lighting by orienting the building to maximise solar gains as well as sheltering it from prevailing winds, a passive solar design will drastically reduce the need to heat/ cool a building same as high levels of insulation and the use of energy efficient windows, use of energy efficient lighting and energy efficient appliances, and minimising energy consumption which could be by incorporating wind turbines and solar panels.
Water
For a building to be considered as leaning towards green there should be a minimisation of water consumption and water efficiency. This can be done by use of recycled water by installing rainwater catchment systems, use of water efficient appliances which include self closing taps, low flush toilets, waterless composting toilets, low flow showerheads amongst others, Installing point of use hot water systems and lagging helps to cut down on heating costs, minimising and attenuating surface water runoff to prevent flooding and pollution.
Materials
Unlike some industries that are moving towards dematerialisation, the construction industry will always need materials. The choice of materials for use in the construction of sustainable buildings or green buildings is therefore very important due to the extensive network of material extraction, processing and transportation steps required to have them in a useful state for the construction site.
These materials to be incorporated into a green building should be materials that have a low environmental impact. This could be that they are locally manufactured or extracted thereby reducing on energy costs involved in transport requirements, or that they are salvaged from reclaimed materials at nearby sites.
Materials for use in sustainable development are assessed by their Life Cycle Analysis (LCA). This looks at their recycled content, durability, embodied energy, waste minimisation and their ability to be reused/ recycled and in certain instances how affordable they are.
Health
To have a green building, eco-home or a sustainable building, there should be use of non toxic materials, natural lighting, having green space, designing for the community, freedom from noise, having private outdoor space and the like. These non toxic materials are moisture resistant and thus deter moulds and spores; they are also emission free and have low or no VOC (Volatile Organic Compounds) content. Use of non toxic materials gives rise to better air quality and a building breathes hence reducing the risk of asthma, allergies and sick building syndrome.
Bringing it home, almost everyone is bemoaning the high tariffs charged by electricity utility companies like Tanesco and Umeme as well as their unreliability, every time there is a dry spell the load shedding is increased (and in most cases not proportionally to the lengths of dry spells).
The water situation is not much better and as for the raw materials, everyday we hear about the scarcity of timber for construction, cement prices are going through the roof and we are importing almost all of our finishing materials from all over the world. You find buildings finished with sanitary ware from England, tiles from Spain, glazing from China, ironmongery from South Africa, electricals from France, switches and sockets from Dubai, and so on.
There is no regard given to the greenness of materials all we are looking out for is a reduced construction cost while in most instances forgetting the whole life cycle cost of the materials and effects of dumping them after use. We do not even think about whether or not they can be recycled or even their VOC content.
Right now and right here is the time for us to get to know what products are being dumped on us and what effects they have on our environment. We need to educate ourselves on how much danger we are exposing ourselves to by using toxic materials in our construction industry. We need to put measures in place to encourage green building in our construction industry. We also need to tap into the natural resources that we have and see how we can rein them in to work for us. We lie astride the equator and can therefore tap solar energy and utilise it to our advantage. Natural daylight is approximately twelve (12) hours a day but we still find many buildings having to use artificial lighting all day and night.
We receive at least 20 inches of rainfall a year and how much is this natural source of water being utilised in the construction industry? The use of these natural occurring materials and methods would also reduce the costs of construction and WLC costs. This would make it a win-win situation all way round. Lets step up to the plate and think green.
Quantity Surveyor Maery Mungati, works with East African Consulting Surveyors and Valuers(Uganda) and sister company Frontiers Property Developers and Realtors(Tanzania). She attained a BSc. Building Economics in 2000 from University College of Dar-es-salaam and an MSc. Construction Management in 2005 from University of Reading (United Kingdom).Maery has worked on a number of projects in Uganda, Tanzania and the United Kingdom. She is also an Incorporate member with the Chartered Institute of Building(CIOB), Member of African Real Estate Society(AfRES) and Member Institute of Surveyors of Uganda (ISU).
