(Hong Kong, 20 November 2015) – The leading advocate for sustainable building development in Hong Kong, the Hong Kong Green Building Council (HKGBC), today marked its sixth anniversary with a special cocktail reception held at Central Plaza, Wan Chai.
The Honourable Mr Paul CHAN Mo-po, MH, JP, Secretary for Development, Government of the HKSAR, Ir Conrad WONG Tin-cheung, BBS, JP, Chairman of the HKGBC and the heads of the four founding members of the HKGBC celebrated the organisation’s key achievements over the past six years. Over one hundred VIP guests from the design, engineering, construction and general business sectors participated in the event.
“Climate change has long been a challenge to the international community and buildings are indeed playing a crucial role in the combat against global warming. By working closely with the general public and private sector communities over the past six years, we are proud to have made tremendous strides towards creating a healthier living environment by reducing carbon emissions from the built environment and making Hong Kong more energy efficient,” said Ir Conrad WONG, Chairman of the HKGBC.
“This past year, in particular, has seen a number of critical milestones,” added Ir Conrad Wong. “Less than a month ago, Hong Kong had the great privilege of hosting the international green building event, WorldGBC Congress 2015 Hong Kong (Congress 2015) for the first time, a true testimony to Hong Kong’s leading position in green building development. Working hand-in-hand with the Construction Industry Council (CIC), the Congress 2015 has successfully attracted over 500 green building leaders from 37 countries to discuss a wide range of topics in respect to government policy, technology and research, rating system and so on. We are thrilled at the overwhelming responses received from the participants, who found the Congress 2015 invaluable and insightful to the realisation of our shared goal – building a green and healthy planet.”
Apart from the huge success of the Congress 2015, the HKGBC continued to advance the creation of a sustainable built environment in Hong Kong. The past year saw the HKGBC’s successful BEAM Plus certification scheme go from strength to strength. The scheme recently reached over 200 million square feet (19 million square metres) of Gross Floor Area (GFA) registration and has achieved 90 million square feet (close to 9 million square metres) of GFA certification since 2010.
The Honourable Mr Paul CHAN Mo-po, MH, JP, Secretary for Development, Government of the HKSAR, joins the Hong Kong Green Building Council to celebrate its sixth anniversary.
Riding on the success of “greening” new buildings over the past years, the HKGBC is expanding its ambitions to also look at existing building retrofits and green communities. “In light of the challenge of retrofitting existing buildings in cities around the world, we recently launched the enhanced tool of BEAM Plus Existing Buildings Assessment Tool v2.0, to encourage building owners to go green by offering flexible assessment methods. We are also excited that another new tool, the BEAM Plus Neighbourhood has entered the pilot testing stage and will be unveiled next year. Placing strong emphasis on community elements, this new tool aims to improve urban liveability.” added Ir Conrad WONG. The HKGBC launched several other important initiatives this year including the HKGBC Green Product Accreditation and Standards (HK G-PASS) and Benchmarking and Energy Saving Tool – Office Buildings (HK BESTOF), which are set in alignment with the ambitions of the Energy Saving Plan released by the Environment Bureau in May 2015.
Beyond driving green building transformations, the HKGBC also seeks to share its commitment in green living with the public and the communities. “The cornerstone of success in creating a low-carbon and healthy environment is community participation, thus we have always put territory-wide campaigns and school education programmes at the top of our agenda.” said Ir Conrad WONG. In September 2015, the CIC and HKGBC successfully staged the third edition of Hong Kong Green Building Week (HKGBW), aiming to further boost awareness on green lifestyle, and drive behavioural and mindset change through a series of programmes.
Looking further ahead, the HKGBC will again join hands with the CIC to host the World Sustainable Built Environment Conference 2017 Hong Kong (WSBE17 Hong Kong).
The triannual conference is regarded as the “Olympics” of green building industry, providing a high-quality platform for thought leaders to explore innovative ideas and collective actions to future sustainable development. Mr Paul CHAN Mo-po, Secretary for Development remarked, “Hosting the WSBE17 Hong Kong demonstrates our determination and enthusiasm in driving the global sustainable built environment. We will seize this opportunity to collate experience and consolidate efforts from different stakeholders, aiming to draw the best set of solutions to address global challenges through all aspects of drivers.” Ir Conrad WONG concurred, “I have full confidence in the CIC and HKGBC to organise this significant event and to lead the green building movement in Hong Kong to another new height.”