Eurofins Product Testing - Sustainable or "Green" Buildings
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"Green Buildings" is a growing movement in a number of countries, namely in the USA, but other countries are experiencing similar developments towards sustainable buildings.
Sustainable building means that energy consumption, use of resources, impact on environment and on human health are considered and optimised during planning, construction, use and demolition - throughout the whole lifecycle of the building. This is also called sustainable building.
More and more public buildings and large office buildings are built green, but also some residential complexes, schools and hospitals are following the movement of sustainability. Motivation is either to raise quality and the sustainability of a building in general and to support environmental protection, or to contribute to Corporate Social Responsibility, or to facilitate marketing of the building with green performance.
There are no uniform criteria for what is considered to be "Green" or sustainable. The best known approach is
- LEED by U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC)
- along with
Other criteria have been or are about to be published by
- French HQE
- German DGNB ("Nachhaltiges Bauen")
- British BREEAM
- Estidama, Abu Dhabi
- Green Building Council of Australia's (GBCA)
- Belgian Valideo
and more. International initiatives can be monitored on websites of the International Initiative for a Sustainable Built Environment (IISBE), World Green Building Council, and in Wikipedia. The SB Alliance is trying to harmonise the Green Building criteria Europe-wide.
A large number of private initiatives can be found, such as
Typically each rating system will have a list of criteria, and in the end there is either a judgement "in compliance" or "no compliance", or there are several performance levels such as "silver", "gold", and "platinum", depending on the degree of compliance with the rating system. Please see the US based LEED as an example.
Eurofins supports architects, planners and suppliers of construction products to achieve compliance. Depending on the relevant country, we do this either with our own experts or we shall direct you to experienced specialists outside Eurofins.
As regards selection of constructions products, interior finishing and furniture, the Eurofins Indoor Air Comfort product certification and similar rating systems may be helpful. Eurofins now partners with SCS (California) on VOC emission testing.
Further Information
Please see our flyer on LEED issues in English or in French, or contact our national organisations or our specialists for using Eurofins expertise that may help to establish sustainable and green buildings.
Please see our presentation on LEED - a new challenge for low VOC emission materials, as presentation slides and as paper, held at CERTECH conference on Odours and Emissions from Materials in October 2009.
Your direct contacts:
Direct contact to Eurofins Product Testing A/S, the world market leader for VOC emissions chamber testing:
Sales: Reinhard Oppl, email ReinhardOppl@eurofins.com
Certification: Dr. Roland Augustin, email ccs@eurofins.com
Eurofins Product Testing A/S