Enhancing the Market Demand for Energy-efficient Materials and Technologies Through National Green Building Rating System

In this article, Ar. Namrata Kaur Mahal and Ar. Aditi Phansalkar emphasize the need of having context-specific architecture solutions instead of current contemporary design solutions which give less or no attention to the carrying capacity of the land, availability of basic resources, such as water and energy, embodied energy of the materials selected for construction, and so on. These modern designs are highly energy and resource intensive. However, since issues related to water, energy, and environment have taken precedence, it comes as a relief that the green building concepts and principles have been rediscovered in the form of a rating system. Keep reading to know more…

Housing in India is on the priority agenda of the new government, given that it reflects the socio-economic mix of its vast population on the global chart. In the year 2015, the Hon’ble Prime Minister of India, Shri Narendra Modi, had crafted the vision of ‘Housing for All‘ by 2022. It is envisioned that by the time the nation completes 75 years of its independence, every family will have a pucca house with water connection, toilet facilities, 24x7 electricity supply and access.

Gap Between Infrastructure and Corresponding Market Development

While decoding the housing requirement for India, it was estimated that about 11 crore housing units would be required for the urban reform. In pursuance of this commitment, the 2016 budget announces exemption from service tax on construction of affordable houses up to 60 square metres under any prevailing scheme of Central and State government, including the Public Private Partnership (PPP) schemes. While the milieu is being made conducive for achieving the objectives of the vision, on the other hand we have approximately 750,000 unsold flats in the top seven cities of the country which includes Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR), National Capital Region (NCR), Bengaluru, Pune, Chennai, Hyderabad, and Kolkata as seen in Figure 1. Approximately, there are 50,000 luxury apartments, priced at an estimated `one lakh crore, lying unsold in Mumbai alone. The number of vacant flats would definitely be more if taken altogether at the national level. Few developers are now reducing the sizes of the apartments to make them more affordable. The point here is that, there is a substantial gap between the prerequisites of the country and the way the market is developing.