Global property industry leaders have agreed to develop an internationally-recognised green buildings standard to help clear up confusion in the market.
Representatives from the UK, Japan, Italy, Finland, Sweden, Denmark and Germany gathered to discuss the issue of establishing a worldwide standard, with a universal agreement that a sustainability standard would enable genuine comparison, measurement and benchmarking.
Liz Peace, chief executive of the British Property Federation and chair of the meeting, said that “heads of companies are bemused and confused and just want clairty” to help them assess the true value of their assets. She expects a standard to be produced within a year and said that there would be scope for individual countries to tailor the standard to suit their needs.
“There was a variety of opinion on softer measures on harder to measure areas, such as how community-friendly a building is,” siad Ms Peace.
“There’s nothing to stop individual countries adding their own soft measures, but we first need to agree on a core set of standards.
“If we can get a formal agreement that each country will contribute their industries’ views, then it would be a great achievement and we would definitely have something to show by next MIPIM [a global property show].”
Other organisations represented at the meeting included the Swedish Property Federation and the Property Council of Australia, with the Italian real estate industry association Assoimmobiliare adding that the current set-up offered no real value.
“All we’ve experienced so far is numbers that mean nothing,” said Gualtiero Tamburni, head of Assoimmobiliare.
“Without a system you cannont compare. Once we have that, we can go to our regional governments and then to the EU with a firm method for dealing with sustainability.”
