University Green Building Report: Design and Implementation

This report delves into the realm of environmentally conscious buildings, emphasizing their significance in sustainable construction, particularly within the Australian context. It explores the need for green buildings, highlighting the benefits of energy efficiency, reduced greenhouse gas emissions, and improved indoor air quality. The report defines environmentally conscious buildings, differentiating them from traditional construction, and details a conceptual design, outlining key components such as solar panels, rainwater reservoirs, and insulation materials. It discusses the life cycle of a green building, from design and construction to operation and maintenance, emphasizing the importance of sustainable materials and practices. The report also addresses the challenges associated with green building development and provides insights into the design considerations and operational aspects that contribute to energy efficiency and environmental responsibility. The conclusion underscores the importance of green building implementation for sustainable development and highlights the transformative potential of these structures in addressing climate change and promoting a more eco-friendly approach to construction.

Running head: SYSTEM ENGINEERING DESIGN
System Engineering Design: Environmentally-Conscious Buildings
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:

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1. Introduction
Fueled that are concerned about the energy, emission of green house gases and the
quality of indoor air also have created an interesting explosion of Environmentally Conscious
Building in the construction industry. The green outlook offers the construction industry a vast
opening towards energy consumption. This report depicts the importance of developing
Environmentally Conscious Building in terms of Green building in Australia. The building
components and operations could be executed successfully after the implementation of the green
building in the construction industry. A divergent process set is needed for implementing
successfully the green model. In order to meet the demand of the Australian Government it is
necessary to develop the programs those are increasing the stringent regulation related to the
water conservation, energy usage, energy efficiency as well.
The construction of green building in Australia currently encountered many impediments
due to the presence of lack of green building project management framework. “The Prince's
Terrace Adelaide” is one of the most well known sustainable buildings of Australia. Even this is
the first 6 star green start rating building that had used 50% lesser energy and 50% of lesser
portable water than the urban dwelling. The definition of Environmentally Conscious Building
and a conceptual design of Environmentally Conscious Building are elaborated in this report.
2. Need definition for the Environmentally Conscious Building (Green
Building)
The construction of green building is referred to as a part of sustainable construction.
Prins (2015) stated that under the context of community the sustainable construction process is

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capable to address different issues related to ecology, social impact and commercial issues also.
In order to dispose the building sustainable constriction is required to be applied throughout the
life cycle of the green construction. Not only during the project development phase but also at
the pre project implementation phase also the concepts of green construction are eventually
applied in the construction industry (Lesovik, et al. 2014). The main aim of construction industry
is to reduce the impact of construction kevel practices over the environment through usage of
planning and managing the construction projects.
It has been found that development of green building is much difficult than development
of a traditional building because the materials needed to develop such building are generally
comes from environmental renewable and non renewable both resources such as solar energy,
water, oxygen, timber etc. In the development of conventional projects the schematic design
processes are consists of different simplified and general level concepts. On the other hand, for
developing green building projects the basic requirements include unique design features (Attia
et al. 2014). In green building the design for the lighting is also different from the traditional
concept. It consists of fixture low energy lightings along with the natural lighting features
through the help of installation of strategic windows. At the same time, it also uses the concept
of energy efficient florescent lighting.
Many other materials are there such as recyclable bamboos, toxic free material; cabinets
free from formaldehyde, non toxic paint are also required to develop energy efficient green
buildings. The green building design concept is divided into three different categories such as
building materials, layout and indoor lighting also. In order to build such energy efficient
buildings it is very much necessary to develop the building layout at the very initial phase. If the
layout is found to be not that much beneficial then, the implemented green building will also not

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be profitable and energy efficient (Kucukvar and Tatari 2013). The green projects are costlier
than the traditional projects. The capital ranges of the green projects are generally 1% to 2.5% of
higher than the general construction projects. In order to integrate the green materials to the
construction project higher cost is required. On the other hand the green material costs ranges
higher around 3% to 4% than the traditional construction materials (Ireland et al. 2015). Though
green buildings are environment friendly but still many challenges are also found to be
associated to this. The development of an environmentally conscious building mainly focuses on
decreasing the overall impact of natural environment.
For successful formation of such project the different divergent processes are required to
be adopted by the green building project development team. In order to develop such building
the valuable elements those are required to be considered include segmentation, relationship and
properties. Different methods are there through which green buildings could be constructed.
Based on the type and quality of projects the project developers are required to use the most
valuable approaches (Taboada 2014). With the help of different improved operations the green
buildings could be constructed. Green building is referred to as a cornerstone for sustainable
development. On the other hand the environmental sustainability could be served by the project
development authority, through the usage of water and energy savings.
In order to construct such buildings the necessary steps those are required to be followed
include:
 Conceptual design
 Construction renovation
 Operation

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 Maintenance
 Material disposal
 Demolition
Figure 1: Life cycle of a green building
(Source: Ireland et al. 2015, pp- 300)
Design: At the very initial phase the green building developers are required to design the
building outline. After analyzing the factors of green building the developer should create a
blueprint of the building. With the help of the blueprint, the developer will be able to understand
about the expected outcome (Louw 2013). The designer must consider the sustainable
components and they must design such a building that could boost up the environmental
economic background, health and productivity performance over the traditional buildings.

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Construction: In order to construct green building only different renewable resources are
required to be considered by the project developer.
Renovation: Even after the development of such building the constructors should make
renovation over the construction to make it more eco friendly.
Operation: The operations of Green buildings are completely different from the
conventional buildings. The development of the project operation would involve the participants
for the
From different survey it has been found that with the help of green building development
materials the annual electricity utilization also gets consumed. It has been demonstrated that
small projects has the ability to make bigger choices if it comes to think about the concept of
sustainability (Australian Conservation Foundation 2017). In order to achieve 6 green star rating,
the first residential that has been developed in Australia is “The Prince’s Terrace Adelaide”. In
order to build community the green project has considered all the renewable resources. In order
to develop a green building it is very much necessary to consider all sustainable construction
materials and also develop certain programs for managing the framework properly (Robinson
and Liu 2015). Currently, with the developing concept of Internet of Things (IoT), the utilization
of technology is also increasing eventually.
Again, one of the most identifiable practices that is required to develop a green building
is a waste management plan, With the help of the waste management plan the issues associated
to the traditional building could be completely mitigated. The other practices that the green
building developers should consider includes aggregated recycling, renewable resources etc

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(Derikvand et al. 2016). In order to construct a green building the general steps those are
required to be followed are illustrated.
3. Conceptual design for Environmentally Conscious Building (Green
Building)
After analyzing the concept of Green building it has been found that, most of the
conceptual design is constructed considering different methods such as decreasing cost of energy
consumption and reducing rate of waste water. With the development of different new
technologies the operations will become much efficient and effective as well (Kashyap and
Parida 2017). Moreover, it can be said that the operational processes are influenced with the
advanced technologies. The design layout, is consists of three different layers. The below
diagram represents the conceptual design of Environment Conscious Building (Green Building):

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Figure 3: Conceptual design for Green building
(Source: created by author)
Figure 3: General design for Green building
(Source: created by author)
The components of the green building are: solar panel, alternative soar panel, quality
insulation material, rain water reservation reservoir, vacuum system, dehumidification system.
Again the principles of the green design are also required to be considered by the development
team. The green building is absolutely different from the conventional building approach. In
order to design a green building the elements those are needed to be incorporated include:

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 Enhancing the data efficiency
 Materials selected for constructing the home
 Increasing the efficiency for using water
 Development in the water quality that helps to improve the health if the family
members
In order to increase the energy efficiency, advanced framing is needed. An advanced
framework will provide structured sound house for along with advanced energy efficiency. It
also helps to reduce the material cost and labor cost as well. With the usage of the hot water the
energy of the home will be consumed up to 25% extra. In order to reduce the standby heat loss,
insulation between the hot water and cold water pipes are required (Hormiga and Scharff 2014).
Not only this, but also the house hold appliances also differs in case of traditional and the green
building. The home feature appliances are very much energy efficient.
The Environment Protection Agency has planned a program named as Energy star to
meet the energy efficient criteria. The other elements selected for developing green building
include air sealing, radian barrier, insulation solar power, thermostat etc. Even the paint that
should be used in such green buildings is required to be non toxic ceramic powder. The other
materials include engineering wood, fiber cement siding and recyclable materials.
Solar panel: With the help of the solar energy converter the solar energy comes the sum
will be automatically converted into electricity and it will eventually reduce the electricity cost.
On the other hand, for forming the operational processes the optional solar energy is found to be
very much helpful. At the top floor of the green building the solar panel is located for absorbing
the solar radiation. For generating the solar power from the solar radiation solar panels are used

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in the green building (Yang, Zou and Keating 2013). In order to form the other operational
processes the alternative solar panels are used. Again there is a reservoir that will store the rain
water.
A porous paving scheme: A porous paving scheme is developed that helps to runoff the
rainwater from the rain water reservoir.
Filtering: For avoiding the outdoor chemicals and for fixing the oil and other fluids
coming from fluid leakage, filter is used n different section of the green building. It can prevent
the water to get contaminated from the water runoff.
Drainage: Drainage is another important thing that is implemented for this building. The
drainage system helps to drain the water from the roof and other surrounding landscape. Even the
drainage allows the water to flow in a proper direction.
Contamination free materials: Materials those are free from microbial contamination are
used by the constructors to build the green building.
After considering the operational requirement of the green building project it has been
found that, for framing a green building it is necessary to use solar panels for implementation
and energy storing as well. With the help of construction activities and planning the
Environmentally-Conscious Building is developed. The components used to build this building
are rain water collecting reservoir, central vacuum system, insulation material etc.
Conclusion
From the overall discussion it can be concluded that for sustainable development,
implementation of green building is very much important. The concept of green building has

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been completely changed with the growing concern of climate change and sustainable
construction. Different project level solution has been offered to overcome the barriers facing by
the green building. There is a large discrimination between the traditional building and green
building. The materials used for developing such building are mostly eco-friendly by nature. In
this report the definition of green building and the conceptual design for green building are
developed.

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References
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