Hang Lung Launches New Strategic Sustainability Framework
Hong Kong Green Building Week 2019 – Kick start a joyful September
Embrace the Greener Future – The Upgraded BEAM Plus New Buildings Assessment to Cope with Evolving Green Building Development
HKGBC website enhancement for better user experience and enriched content
Driving excellence through the unified green product scheme and fostering retro-commissioning practices
Sharing Session on the Learning Outcomes of “My Green Space” Green Building Competition for Schools 2018-19
Green Offices and Green Commercial Buildings Together for the Sake of Benefitting Employees
Hang Lung Launches New Strategic Sustainability Framework
| Hang Lung Group Limited and Hang Lung Properties Limited have published their online Sustainability Reports 2018, which outline the Companies’ new strategic sustainability framework, Our Sustainable Future. |
Hang Lung Group Limited and Hang Lung Properties Limited have published their online Sustainability Reports 2018, which outline the Companies’ new strategic sustainability framework, Our Sustainable Future, with clear goals and targets leading towards 2030. The long-term framework, together with the publication of the seventh standalone sustainability reports, reaffirms Hang Lung’s unwavering commitment to sustainable development and enhancing value for shareholders and stakeholders.
Upholding the sustainability principle of Build to Own, Build to Last, Build for Our Future, Hang Lung embraces high standards of corporate governance, customer centricity, service excellence, and social and environmental commitments across all aspects of its business operations. The new framework builds on the solid foundation of existing sustainability achievements and gleans from insights collected from a comprehensive stakeholder engagement exercise undertaken in 2018. It sets out nine focus areas under three pillars of Future of Experience, Future of Space, and Best-in-class Operating Practices, with 11 new targets leading up to 2030.
The Sustainability Reports 2018 of Hang Lung Group and Hang Lung Properties are now available for download at www.hanglung.com.
Hang Lung Group:
http://www.hanglung.com/SustainabilityReports/2018/HLP/HLP_SR2018_EN.pdf
Hang Lung Properties:
http://www.hanglung.com/SustainabilityReports/2018/HLP/HLP_SR2018_EN.pdf
1. In an affirmation of our commitment to customer centricity and service excellence, Hang Lung launched the brand-new Customer Relationship Management program HOUSE 66 in Shanghai and Jinan.
2. To minimize the environmental impact of the business operation, Hang Lung is dedicated to adopting best practices in designing and constructing buildings.
Hong Kong Green Building Week 2019 – Kick start a joyful September
| Stay tuned for the wonderful programmes of Hong Kong Green Building Week 2019! |
The highlight of HKGBW 2019 is the first ever Green Building Exploration Challenge. Participants will check-in various BEAM Plus certified buildings or green buildings in Kowloon East to learn the green building features and their benefits via fun games.
Moreover, there will also be a Green Carnival at the Zero Carbon Building (ZCB) to promote sustainable lifestyle and educate green building information to mass public by activities likae Green Workshops, Green Bazaar, mini games, guided tours, stage performance etc. Visitors can also join our Bus Tour to travel and visit to different green buildings in Kowloon East.
Biz-Green Dress Day, which encourages office workers to support for a greener workplace by wearing light yet professional to save energy through reducing air-conditioning consumption, will be held on 5 September.
Registration for “Green Building Exploration Challenge” will be open soon, check out the HKGBW website for more details.
Embrace the Greener Future
The Upgraded BEAM Plus New Buildings Assessment to Cope with Evolving Green Building Development
| There are an escalating number of BEAM Plus certified buildings in Kowloon East, the up-and-coming central business district, creating a more sustainable community. |
As one of the important assessment tools that push forward the green building development in Hong Kong, BEAM Plus New Buildings (NB) has attracted over 1,000 project registrations. With the industry innovation and development, the Council works with BEAM Society Limited (BSL) to upgrade the BEAM Plus NB tool to version 2.0, in hopes of encouraging greener and healthier buildings in Hong Kong while increasing livability of the city for decades to come.
With the success of BEAM Plus NB V1.2, the upgraded V2.0 includes major revision to the assessment guidelines, in response to the evolving industry development and comments from the stakeholders. Below are three major features of the upgraded V2.0 assessment:
More Human Centric
People nowadays embrace healthy lifestyle, while growing number of study and research has identified the value of wellness in boosting productivity of employees. As we spend almost 90% of time indoor daily, buildings play a crucial role in creating a healthy environment for building users. In response to the growing demand for healthy buildings, the enhanced version of BEAM Plus NB V2.0 rebranded one of the assessment aspects as “Health and Wellbeing”, to demonstrate the increasing focus on human environmental quality of buildings.
The rebranded “Health and Wellbeing” aspect concerns more the human aspect in relation to the buildings. Apart from indoor environmental quality, such as daylight access, ventilation, noise isolation, indoor air quality, thermal comfort, etc., impacting the health, comfort and wellbeing of the occupants, human centric design elements are also considered in the assessment, for example, provision of design measures that encourage healthy and active living, adoption of biophilic design that allows building users to nurture the innate connection with the nature, etc.
1. Public art in the building environment can help improve the living and working experience of building users, while integrating physical activities in the building design can help people with the active lifestyle.
2. Biophilic design can be accomplished by, for example, providing greenery in and around the building, so that building users can feel connected with the nature while living in the urban environment.
More Integrated Green Building Design
For a building to sustain its greenness throughout its building life cycle, the integrated design approach is recommended that all stakeholders are engaged in setting the environmental goals and objectives. Multiple groups of professionals collaborate to think of the entire green building and all of its equipment and system in multi-disciplines, in order to assure well integration throughout the process from design to construction.
To foster closer cooperation and embrace the integrated design approach to green buildings, a new assessment aspect – Integrated Design and Construction Management (IDCM), is added in the BEAM Plus NB V2.0 assessment. While there are various assessment criteria that encourage adoption of the integrated design process, credits are also given to higher degree of involvement of BEAM Professionals and BEAM Affiliates, as well as application of smart technologies that facilitate communications among the project team members.
More Adaptable, Certain and Practical
The fundamentals of the major revision of BEAM Plus NB are to maintain the assessment criteria beyond the statutory requirement, while the assessment is adaptable, certain and practical to more diverse types of projects. Every assessment criteria was reviewed to cope with the evolving industry development.
During development of the enhanced version, various stakeholder engagement sessions were also held to collect feedback from the industry. With the comments about experience of undergoing assessment, the assessment manual of BEAM Plus NB V2.0 is also re-designed, providing more guidance to project teams on pursuing success in the assessment. More about the improvement of the manual will be introduced in the next issue of GreenMAG Plus+.
HKGBC website enhancement for better user experience and enriched content
| The HKGBC website is revamped. |
In celebration of the 10th anniversary of the Council, we are glad to announce that enhancements were made on HKGBC website to improve the user online experience, as well as to provide enriched content to our stakeholders. The revamped website with the intuitive interface was launched in early July. The responsive website design provides the best navigation for users on the go.
In terms of content, a new section – Resources, is added to BEAM Plus Online Exhibition page to showcase media coverage on BEAM Plus.
Besides, with the digital transformation of BEAM Plus project registration and certification, BEAM Plus project teams now have their project online accounts, where they can login, access and update the project information anytime and anywhere. It allows better communication and support between the HKGBC Secretariat and the project teams.
To foster researches and maintain transparency, the revamped BEAM Plus Project Directory and Statistics provides more comprehensive information about BEAM Plus projects. Project narrative and the building visual, as well as links to the project pages at BEAM Plus Online Exhibition, are included in the project directory, to allow the public to understand more about the project. Also, a snapshot of BEAM Plus project statistics is provided, and it becomes more interactive that the public can segment the number of BEAM Plus registered and assessed projects according to the project types, owners and ratings.
Driving excellence through the unified green product scheme and fostering retro-commissioning practices
The CIC Green Product Certification, is a new brand formed by unification of the Carbon Labelling Scheme (CLS) and HKGBC Green Product Accreditation and Standards (HK G-PASS). The comprehensive scheme takes a wide spectrum of aspects into consideration and clearly identifies assessment standards for different categories. The new scheme will better enable building and construction practitioners in making informed decisions on selection and procurement of products and materials with minimal environmental impact. Through the joint effort between Construction Industry Council (CIC) and HKGBC, resources can be maximised to lead the CIC Green Product Certification into a new era as the leading products/materials certification standard serving the Hong Kong construction and building industry.
Meanwhile, being a professional body and partner to the Government, the Council facilitates existing building practitioners to implement a knowledge-based energy management and retro-commissioning practices to identify improvement potentials on energy saving through organising technical seminars and professional trainings, as well as setting up standards and guidelines with Electrical and Mechanical Services Department (EMSD).
To further promote and foster the adoption of retro-commissioning in the regions beyond the Greater Bay Area, the Council signed a Memorandum of Co-operation (MoC) on retro-commissioning with EMSD and several professional institutions in Greater Bay Area, forming a cross border collaboration to push forward and exchange views on retro-commissioning practices among the regions. The HKGBC will also collaborate with the MoC signatory partners to conduct retro-commissioning pilot studies and nurture related professionals.
Sharing Session on the Learning Outcomes of “My Green Space” Green Building Competition for Schools 2018-19
| Representatives from the Education Bureau, HKGBC, winning teachers and students gave sharing on various topics, including sustainability education, green building knowledge and winning tips of the Competition. |
With the support of the Education Bureau, a sharing session on Green Building Competition for Schools was held on 26 June. The Education Bureau invited around 20 local teachers to attend for exchanging ideas and experiences with the winning teams.
Ms Rachel LAM from the Education Bureau shared the importance of sustainability education towards students and admired the values of the Competition. Ms Mary CHAN, HKGBC Director, introduced the design and theory of well-known green buildings worldwide. Ms Grace KWOK, the Convenor of the Competition, recapped the Competition and appreciated all entries were with very high quality.
The winning students from the Primary and Secondary Division then highlighted the creative concepts of their entries and shared the green building knowledge acquired by participating the Competition. Besides, their teachers agreed that students’ environmental awareness was strengthened, which in turns assisting them to utilise the knowledge in daily lives. They also thought the tours and workshops organised for the participants could help broaden their horizon.
The attending teachers gained valuable experiences from winning teams. Let us look forward to the significant results in the next Competition!
Green Offices and Green Commercial Buildings Together for the Sake of Benefitting Employees
Spending at least eight hours a day at work, office workers hope for a comfortable and healthy working environment that can safeguard their well-being, as well as enhance their productivity. With good indoor environmental quality, a healthy office environment located in a green building could benefit a company in terms of employees’ productivity.
Plenty of offices in Hong Kong are becoming more caring to the workers. M Moser Hong Kong Office recently achieved Platinum Rating under BEAM Plus Interiors. Air quality sensors are incorporated within the office for real-time 24/7 IAQ measurement, in order to keep the indoor environment healthy all the time.
While maintaining the green office with sound indoor environmental quality, energy efficient equipment at the building and practices by the building management are also keys to green buildings and offices. There are growing number of certified green commercial buildings, of which Kingston International Centre is one of them which is recently certified as Final Platinum rating under BEAM Plus New Buildings. Making use of renewable energy, a generator powered by biodiesel is installed to supply electricity for some of the facilities. Existing buildings can become greener as well. For example, Sun Hung Kai Centre recently obtained Excellent Grade in Energy Use aspect under BEAM Plus Existing Buildings. The skyscraper achieved over 15% of annual energy reduction. With effective energy saving initiatives, environmental impact could be reduced when tenants can enjoy the facilities in the green buildings.
Setting a role model in green buildings, the Council has its Secretariat office located at the Jockey Club Environmental Building which achieved Final Platinum rating under BEAM Plus Existing Buildings. Our office is also one of the BEAM Plus Interiors Platinum-certified projects, with a view to enhancing health and well-being of the Secretariat staff.
1. Sun Hung Kai Centre has achieved “Excellent” in the Energy Use Aspect of BEAM Plus Existing Buildings V2.0 Selective Scheme.
2. M Moser Hong Kong Office has achieved Platinum Rating under BEAM Plus Interiors.
3. Kingston International Centre has achieved Platinum BEAM Plus New Buildings V1.2.