Publisher's Synopsis
Environmental issues are becoming increasingly important, and good building design can contribute considerably to reducing pollution and improving the environment. The assessment method described here specifies criteria for a range of issues concerning the global, neighbourhood and internal environment. The main objectives of the assessment method are: to provide recognition for buildings which are friendlier to the global environment than normal practice and so help stimulate a market for them; to improve the internal environmental quality and occupant health; to raise awareness of the dominant role the use of energy in buildings plays in global warming through the greenhouse effect, and in the production of acid rain and the depletion of the ozone layer; to reduce the long term impact buildings have on global environmental hazards; to provide a common set of targets and standards so that false claims of environmental friendliness are avoided; to encourage designers to achieve environmentally sensitive buildings.;This assessment method, which is carried out at the design stage, is based on readily available and generally accepted information. The method identifies and credits designs where specific targets are met. It is not expected that designs will meet all of the target requirements. Meeting one or more means that the building is likely to be environmentally better than buildings where these issues have not been addressed.;Environmental assessments can in principle be applied to all types and ages of buildings. The issues involved are complex. To make immediate progress, the first development of the Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment (BREEAM 1) relates to new office buildings only. The items included are those for which there is good evidence of the environmental problems they cause, and which can readily be assessed at the design stage. There are many environmental issues which have been omitted in the first version. Some of the issues listed at the end of the report will be appropriate for later versions as evidence becomes available. The emphasis of BREEAM 1 is on actions taken today, usually with little or no additional life cycle cost impact. The assessment is intended to be voluntary.;A scheme which seeks to improve both the health of the building occupants and reduce the amount of external environmental pollution should face the difficult problem of assigning a relative weighting to the different effects. It is believed that a relative weighting scheme is not possible today because of the great difficulty in putting an economic cost to the long term effects of environmental issues such as global warming. A pragmatic approach has been developed which accepts that it is important to take action in the short term. No common scale is used. Individual credits are given where satisfactory attention is given to each of the items in the assessment. The assessment separates the items into global effects - where the benefits include reducing carbon dioxide emissions, acid rain and ozone depletion; neighbourhood effects - where the benefits are to outdoor environment near to the building and indoor effects where the benefits are to the health, safety and well-being of the occupants.;Where health aspects are covered by building regulations, other legislation or by the normal practice of architects and consulting services engineers during design, there is no need to consider them in the scheme. Attention will only be paid to those things which are at the forefront of current knowledge but have yet to become standards aspects of building design. However, not all of the issues of current research and media concern have reached the stage where there is sufficient evidence for action through an environmental assessment. Items will only be included where there is some "authoritative evidence" that a real risk is involved and can be assessed. The assessment scheme credits buildings which may improve the internal environmental conditions of the occupants beyond those of buildings meeting the minimum standards of building regulations. Future versions of the assessment scheme will br produced as further information on health hazards becomes available.
