In today’s environmentally-conscious age, sustainability has become a metaphor for corporate and legislative responsibility. With buildings responsible for over 40% of all energy consumption, meeting sustainability targets is now a key aspiration – and a regulatory requirement – on most major projects. Buro Happold’s high quality, flexible and adaptable designs set a new benchmark for engineering sustainability. In our people-centred environments the technology is not an end in itself but the means of creating buildings and public spaces which promote occupant comfort, safety and wellbeing.
To assess the ‘amount’ of sustainability in a new project scheme we ‘judge’ it against a number of socio-economic and environmental categories chosen for their relevance to national and local policies on sustainable development. This assessment allows us to identify the project’s environmental objectives and then put in place the engineering and management processes needed to deliver them. Advice from Buro Happold’s engineering sustainability consultants is another vital element in delivering a workable action plan. With our integrated approach we are then able to synthesise the many aspects of the design into a coherent whole in order to meet sustainability targets.
Sustainability must take into account physical, social, economic and environmental factors and how they impact on whole life costs and business benefits. While recognising their environmental obligations, clients and stakeholders need to know that sustainability doesn’t come at the expense of commercial viability. Our experience shows that an environmentally sensitive approach is fully compatible with cost-effective construction and operation and can generate real benefits, such as faster planning consent, greater lifetime asset value and improved human interaction and productivity.
As experts in sustainable design we always aim to incorporate a responsible, global view of energy consumption, using low energy building systems and renewable technology whenever possible. Embracing environmental best practice, our designs are based on an energy-saving strategy that provides comfortable and healthy interior climate solutions with less dependence on ‘active’ systems. We aim to maximise passive environmental control – including natural ventilation, external shading, thermal mass and daylighting – to make a building more user-friendly, low energy and low maintenance.
