Green Sense: Sustainbility Guidelines in Built Environment May 29 - 31, 2017

A 3 days Training Programme titled "Green Sense: Sustainability Guidelines in Built Environment" was organized by Centre for Science and Environment, New Delhi for Central Public Works Department (CPWD) architects from May 29, 2017 to May 31,2017 in the Lecture Hall of National CPWD Academy, Ghaziabad. The seminar was actively attended by 30 Architects across the nation, inclusive of Assistant Architects and Deputy Architects working for CPWD.

A first day started with the introductory session which was conducted by Mr. Rajneesh Sareen, Programme Director, Sustainable buildings and Habitat programme CSE. He presented the presentation on "Reaching Sustainability in built environment". He initiated with giving a brief about Sustainability - Need of an hour and further highlighted on bridging the gap in sustainable built sense with regard to understanding green, performance benchmarking for green and right institutionalization for green.

An exercise was conducted after the introductory session among the participants in which all 30 architects were divided into 5 groups consisting 6 members per group. All the five groups were given some set of questions on 5 different thematic zones chosen by each group differently (Land, Energy Conservation, Waste, Water Conservation, and Air Quality & Outdoor Spaces) , they need to answer those according to their understanding level and present a brief description about their respective topic by one member from each group at the end.

The afternoon session was taken by Chhavi Sharda, Water Programme, CSE on "Water Sensitive design and Planning” with focus on rain water harvesting (RWH) and decentralized wastewater treatment (DWWT). She talked about waste water treatment techniques and management in buildings

The second day started by Mr. Sameer Divekar, Director of dbHMS consultants on "Energy Modelling & Simulation" and " Energy Efficient Technologies - HVAC & Lighting." He initiated with the need of energy simulations which helps in calculating the building load before construction and making it more efficient beforehand only. Discussion was followed by the composition of various components of  heat gain and energy consumption by the building so that it could be well managed and transformed to be energy efficient, the decision making for finalizing the building envelope in terms of building shape and form and Day light study in terms of amount of glazing & type of glazing required. He also presented about the optimized usage of glass and different types of shading devices which further help to build an energy efficient enclosure. Discussion further lead to displaying various case studies on "Net Zero & Energy Conserving Buildings" such as Zero Energy House, Chicago, which was on Net Zero- Energy,Water & Waste approach, Institute of Rural Research and Development, Gurgaon, Nalanda University, Bihar, IIT Gandhinagar etc.

He was followed by Swati Singh Sambyal, CSE on "Solid Waste Management Policies & Practices in India." Her presentation began with the current scenario in India about the waste composition followed by various existing policies and practices initiated by government in India such as Swach Bharat Mission, Solid waste management rules etc along with their potentials and constraints. Afterwards she highlighted the issues related to solid waste collection, disposal and treatment. Afterwards description about the  process of solid waste collection and waste disposal following with treating it in Sewage Treatment Plant was done. The major problem is segregation of solid waste i.e. wet and dry waste. She stressed over proper disposal of hazardous waste and suggested not to dump e-waste to the ragpickers but handover to registered recyclers/vendors. The best models of solid waste management in India i.e. Alappuzha, Mysuru and Panaji were discussed. Where solid waste is collected and how it is segregated at household level and then hand over to registered recycler/vendors following with composting and recycling was part of her presentation. An initiative was actively taken for not using disposable packaging packages on individual level by one and all present there. She opined that the solution of solid waste management is to minimize waste at household level so that the problem of solid waste is solved in a simpler manner. 

The third day began with a presentation which was given by Mr. Vevaik Mahajan, dbHMS consultants on "Energy Conservation Building Code - An Approach towards Energy Efficiency." He initiated with current and future trend and potentials of building sector in terms of energy consumption and conservation in India followed by the introduction of various codes under ECBC along with their details and objectives as well. He also presented the ECBC design norms for the building and the emphasis was given on minimizing the load from the building in order to make the building more efficient using various fixtures and materials through which energy consumption could be less and further resulting in conserving the energy. He concluded with the impact of ECBC and focused on making the building envelope which consumes less energy in terms of load and yet properly workable.

Later in the afternoon, Mr. Rajneesh Sareen, Programme Director, Sustainable buildings and Habitat programme CSE further continued and presented the presentation on "Sustainability in a Built Environment" and talked about how sustainability can be achieved in terms of site considerations, planning, building design, usage of sustainable material and water smart landscaping. He also introduced CSE initiatives under various thematic areas of built environment and later provided an introduction to CSE sustainability benchmarking with special focus on operational benchmarking of built infrastructure and stress was given on Green Mandate mentioning about all the clearances needed for the execution of the project. Discussion further lead to sustainability building guidelines for Andhra Pradesh and the live project of CSE Anil Agarwal Environment Trainings Institute (AAETI), Nimli in Alwar District, Rajasthan and CSE building in Delhi to demonstrate the efforts to achieve sustainability goals. Brief description was given about the Nimli project in which the campus is designed by keeping in view climate analysis, shading analysis, heat island impact, window wall ratio, day lighting analysis, rain water harvesting and various shading devices both immovable and movable to control heat and glare.