ZEMCH 2015 - International Conference Proceedings | Page 258

Introduction
‘Sustainability’ the widely used term defined by the United States’ Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA) as “what we need for our survival from surrounding natural environment, either
directly or indirectly, it creates a kind of harmony and maintains between humans and nature”
(EPA 2012).Sustainability as a concept has three poles; Economy, Society, and Environment, where
ESTIDAMA Pearl rating system developed by Abu Dhabi Urban Planning Centre added ‘Culture’ as
a fourth pole of sustainability concept (ADUC 2010).

Figure 1:Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Emissions from buildings (US DOE 2012)
As the main causes of global warming and climate change are largely chemical, the urgent human act today is reducing the fossil fuels burning, industrial emissions and other human activities
with the negative environmental impact. This requires significant efforts especially with the rapid
increase of world population and the consequence need for energy as a power of life and economic growth.
Sustainable Buildings
‘Sustainable Buildings’, ‘High Performance Buildings’ or ‘Green Buildings’, all of which are interchangeably terms refers to comprehensively address the ecological, social and economic issues
of building and community. In the same content, ‘Sustainable Building’ term could be defined as
a healthy facilities designed and built using ecological based principle and taking in to consideration efficient manners (Kibert 2009).The term ‘Sustainable Building’ refers to the structure that is
designed, built, renovated, operated, or reused in an ecological and resources efficient manner.
For well-designed green buildings, no additional cost may require implementing Green Building
specifications, and it should be noted that many green building measures can be incorporated
with minimal or zero increased in capital cost.
On the other hand, the sustainable construction may have a higher capital cost, but saves through
lower operating costs over the life of the building, and in order to reach the high level of effec-

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ZEMCH 2015 | International Conference | Bari - Lecce, Italy