M10 AM Building Life-Cycle Capacity in the Greening of Buildings and Construction Consideration
Monday, 14 November 2005: 8:00 AM - 11:40 AM in 341-342

(KAS-1118-356095) Life-cycle Analysis of Green Building: An Environmentally Sustainable Approach.

Kassim, Ph.D., T.¹, Dragovick, Ph.D., P.E., J.¹, ¹ Seattle University, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, P.O. Box 222000, Seattle, WA 98122-1090, USA

ABSTRACT- Buildings account for one-sixth of the world's fresh water withdrawals, one-quarter of its wood harvest, and two-fifths of its material and energy flows. Building and construction activities worldwide consume 3 billion tons of raw materials each year (i.e., 40% of total global use). Building "green" is an opportunity to use our natural resources efficiently while creating healthier buildings that improve human health, build a better environment, and provide cost savings. A green building (i.e., a sustainable building), is a structure that is designed, built, renovated, operated, or reused in an ecological and resource-efficient manner. Green buildings are designed to meet certain objectives such as protecting occupant health; improving employee productivity; using energy, water, and other resources more efficiently; and reducing the overall impact to the environment. Using green building approach, materials and products would promote conservation of diminishing non-renewable resources worldwide. In addition, integrating green building materials into building projects can help reduce the environmental impacts associated with the extraction, transport, processing, fabrication, installation, reuse, recycling, and disposal of these building industry source materials. This paper explores the role that life-cycle analysis (LCA) can have in the built environment. It begins by defining the life-cycle stages of the building process. Each stage is then analyzed for its information needs, its impacts on the environmental performance of the building and the resulting life-cycle assessment technique, which can inform this stage. The discussion is illustrated by the use of a case study outlining what is currently possible and the areas where further research is needed to make LCA part of the answer.

Key words: life-cycle analysis, green building, sustainability, LCA