Top developers are now betting on green buildings. Green building ,so to say use less energy, water and natural resources, creates less waste and is healthier for the people living inside compared to a standard building – to flatter large number of leaseholder. Even though green buildings involve an incremental cost of 7-10% over traditional buildings, developers see it as an opportunity for differentiation in a growing market.
The trigger is a growing environment consciousness among topnotch tenants, particularly the multinationals. In the request for proposals (RFPs) that are coming in, many MNCs are starting to ask the question about the green quotient. Jones Lang Lasalle-Meghraj chairman and country head Anuj Puri said, “It may not be mandatory today but going forward, many MNCs will make it mandatory”. Developers such as K Raheja and RMZ have decided to go all green.
RMZ’s 1.9 million square feet mall, RMZ Galleria, in Bangalore is currently under construction and will be a green development. So will be K Raheja’s Mindspace projects at Mumbai and Hyderabad, both of which are currently under development. According to CII-Indian Green Building Council (IGBC), 147 million square feet of green space has been registered in India to date across a total of 239 projects. At the moment, K Raheja is planning and developing around 14.5 million square feet of green space across the country. K Raheja associate vice-president Shabbir Kanchwala said, “We are looking at the long-term and want to be the first ones to go green in a big way”.
The Lodha Group, though, is getting into it only partially. Lodha Group senior vice-president Bharat Dhuppar said, “Only our commercial buildings will be green”. Lodha has about twelve buildings in the pipeline and most of them will be commissioned between 2009 and 2010.
In their projects, K Raheja expects the cost to be around 7-8% higher. The savings, though, will be considerable. Kanchwala declared, “We are looking at 30-40% power saving and about 20% water saving”. Further he added, “Also in construction, we try and use a lot of recycled materials — aluminum and glass — as well as mix fly ash with the concrete that is used”. The use of glass too is being reduced. Selvarasu said, “We keep the use of glass to the minimum, to about 35% in commercial and about 20% in retail”.
In a world where energy costs are going up by the day and investments in energy are peaking, a green building which saves precious energy and comes at the same rental for the occupier is a decent marketing tool for developers. Kanchwala said, “Many of our customers are Fortune 500 companies who understand and prefer green buildings”. Selvarasu said, “The future is in sustainability”.