Building Sustainability [Elektronisk resurs] Understanding, Defining and Measuring Building Sustainability

• Quality management (QM) is in large part about managing and sustaining change to achieve a desiredoutcome, improved quality. Integrating sustainable development with QM practices, defining a higherpurpose for the business activities, and applying systems perspective are three out of five identifiedresearch themes of future importance for the field of QM. Moving from the general synergies betweenQM and sustainable development, this paper explores the concept of building sustainability based onthe five-step logic of understanding, defining, measuring, communicating and leading change. The newSwedish regulation, ‘klimatdeklaration’ (climate declaration), solidifies the well-establishedsustainability indicator CO2-emissions and intends to spur a common understanding for life-cyclethinking along the building value chain. Based on the emerging QM scope of stakeholders focus, peopleand planet are suggested as key stakeholders and profit, the third part of the triple bottom line, isinterpreted as a means to satisfy stakeholder needs. The five-step logic of, understanding, defining,measuring, communicating and leading change is used to explain how actors can move fromunderstanding to leading change. With an emphasis on understanding the concept of sustainabledevelopment and defining the interpretation of it, previous studies are used to conclude an indicativelack of understanding for building sustainability. The many indicators used in different sustainabilityperformance rating programs, like BREEAM and LEED, and in the sustainability reports of globalcompanies, indicates an inconsistency that hinders comparative analysis. In measuring buildingsustainability there is no lack of indicators, the challenge lies with the choice of indicators and providinga clear motivation for the choices based on an explicit interpretation of sustainable development.Finding and uniting around a common paradigm for sustainability, with regards to the higher purposeof an actor along the value chain, is suggested as a key activity in accelerating the transition towardsbuilding sustainability. 

Ämnesord

Engineering and Technology  (hsv)

Civil Engineering  (hsv)

Other Civil Engineering  (hsv)

Teknik och teknologier  (hsv)

Samhällsbyggnadsteknik  (hsv)

Annan samhällsbyggnadsteknik  (hsv)

Engineering Science  (uu)

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government publication  (marcgt)