Climate positivity: Net Zero and beyond

This year’s Green Building Convention by Green Building Council South Africa (GBCSA) is, once again, challenging the building industry to raise the baar on sustainability standards. Where once the challenge was to “Do less bad”, the call now is to “Do more good”. This year’s convention theme is “Zero+: Net Zero Today, Climate Positive Tomorrow”, which, says GBCSA CEO Lisa Reynolds, “reflects our commitment to achieving net zero emissions by 2050”. A few projects are already leading the way in the net-zero and net-positive race – here are some of the trailblazers in different categories.

NET-POSITIVE ECOLOGY: DSM-FIRMENICH SOUTH AFRICA OFFICE, MIDRAND

An existing Midrand office building – now occupied by dsm-firmenich, a leading global producer of sustainable nutrition, health and beauty products – targeted four Net Positive certifications for its offices; Carbon, Water, Waste and Ecology. Ashley Sams, dsm-firmenich’s Workplace Lead Africa, explains that sustainability is an intrinsic part of the company’s ethos: “We live it through the products, services and solutions we offer. Working together with the professional team, we were able to transform our landscape and redress our site’s ecological value in a positive manner, fostering a positive outcome for people and planet.” Last year the building became the first GBCSA-certified Net Positive Ecology – Level 2 – Operational Ecology (measured) project in South Africa.

Around 1500m2 of the site required a regenerative landscape, which was calculated through GBCSA’s ecology calculator. The original landscaping included exotic gardens and kikuyu lawns. Marc Sherratt, Managing Director of Marc Sherratt Sustainability Architects (MSSA), was responsible for the project’s landscape and ecology aspects. He established that the site’s native landscape would have been Egoli Granite Grassland, listed as a critically endangered ecosystem, so he set about replacing the existing kikuyu lawn and other exotic planting with ethically sourced indigenous species that would previously have been endemic to the region. Over 4 000 different plants and 140 different species were planted across the site. A sensory pathway was included in the design, allowing building occupants to enjoy and engage with the natural environment – this included signage that highlighted specific plants with particular flavours, fragrances or medicinal uses.

Sherratt shares that ongoing site monitoring has shown the return of fauna such as grassland mice and the slender mongoose. As a result, the client is changing its pest-control strategy to non-poison traps. Now that there is prey in the vicinity, owl boxes are being installed. These are all signs of a healthy ecosystem. Sherratt adds that the client is looking into having the land declared a conservation servitude, which would legally protect the landscape in the title deed in perpetuity. Any future property owners would then be legally accountable for maintaining the health of the ecosystem. It could also earn them money if it was linked to the country’s biodiversity offset programme and sold as offset credits.

Net-Zero Waste: 1 Discovery Place, Sandton

Discovery’s Head Office in Sandton has been making waves since its 6-Star Green Star (Office V1.1 As-Built) certification in 2018, followed by a 5-Star Interiors certification in 2021. The latest feather in Discovery’s Green cap is its Net-Zero Waste – Level 2 – Operational Waste (measured) certification. This means that more than 90% of the waste produced by this 147 000m² corporate office is diverted from landfill.

According to Discovery Group founder and Chief Executive Adrian Gore, the company is “founded on a core purpose of making people healthier … We have understood that business is not detached from social and environmental issues but exists to help address these issues in a sustainable way”. So, making its offices as sustainable as possible was non-negotiable.

Vanessa Drummond, Environmental Operations and Technical Admin Manager at Discovery, says “Recycling and waste management started as a project many years ago – it is now my passion.” Her excitement is palpable as she explains how this remarkable achievement began. It started with the bold objective of achieving zero waste to landfill by 2023, and the strategy started to develop based on the “5W1H” approach. The “who” and the “where” questions were obvious, and the “why” could easily be answered by referring to Discovery’s core purpose. That left “what”, “how” and “when”. Drummond and her team conducted a comprehensive audit of all the waste produced within the building and began to facilitate on-site sorting, diverting waste to be recycled or composted. “Quick wins” were targeted first, with food and beverage vendors quickly switching to biodegradable or recyclable packaging.

The “how” then came through networking with, and learning from, other companies, finding waste processing and recycling partners, and educating staff across all Discovery’s sites. Custom-built waste stations were designed, providing bin facilities for recyclables, organic waste and landfill. An internal marketing and education campaign was developed, teaching building occupants about the new strategies, as well as the overarching reasons as to why waste needed to be reduced. This included encouraging at-home recycling, which was promoted further by providing a basement recycling depot for staff to drop off household waste. This campaign was launched in early 2022, answering the “why” of the strategy, and the programme has already been rolled out across Discovery’s other sites.

“We’ve also recently been awarded a Net-Zero Waste (Level 2 – Operational Waste (measured) rating on our building in Century City, Cape Town, and are awaiting GBCSA’s feedback on the Net-Zero accreditation results for our Kwazulu Natal and Gqeberha sites”, adds Drummond.

Net-Zero Carbon: Bank of Botswana, Gaborone

The Bank of Botswana headquarters in Gaborone is a building renovation and extension project that achieved a 6-Star Green Star Design rating on its completion in 2022. It became one of the first Green Star-certified new-build office developments in that country, setting a benchmark for future projects. The bank HQ recently received a Net-Zero Carbon – Level 1 – Emissions (modelled) certification, with no purchased emissions offsets.

This ambitious project, known as the Pula-Thebe Initiative, after the local currency, followed a year-long master-plan study to establish the best design for the complex. The resultant structures, with a usable office space area of 9 554m² over five floors, made use of 70% of the existing buildings in the new design. Of the demolished material, 97% was diverted from landfill by being reused or recycled, contributing significantly to a reduced embodied carbon footprint. Its overall operational energy usage is reduced through the inclusion of smart, energy-saving technologies, while a ventilated facade design adds to the passive climate-control strategy. An energy model of the building was done as part of the design development, and this was compared to a notional building model, showing significant improvements over the prescribed Green Star notional model. Much of the power requirements are supplied by solar installations, producing 634MWh per year.

The electricity usage for lighting and power is measured by separate sub-meters, allowing accurate monitoring of power usage on each floor, and a Building Management System (BMS) monitors and controls much of the building’s operations. Meter readings and other statistics are displayed on screens in the main entrance lobby and security control office, allowing occupants to see the usage patterns – but also to flag any unusual usage, enabling anomalies to be checked timeously and repairs made to faulty equipment. In the interests of financial transparency, all additional costs associated with implementing green building practices were disclosed.

Annelidé Sherratt, Head of Green Building Certifications (New Build and Interiors) at Solid Green, the sustainability consultants on this project, explains there were many innovations on this project, even beyond the new Net-Zero Carbon rating. She adds that the building’s “holistic approach not only minimises environmental impact, but also sets a strong example of how office developments can balance sustainability with functionality and innovation”.

Net-Zero Water: The District, Cape Town

The District is an existing building in Cape Town’s suburb of Woodstock. Part of the Growthpoint Properties portfolio, the 18 720m² office building achieved 4-Star Green Star Existing Building Performance V1 certification in 2016. In December 2018 it was awarded a Net-Zero Water (Pilot) – Level 2 – Occupant Consumption (modelled) certification. Sustainability Engineer and Founder at Ecolution Consulting André Harms, the sustainability consultant and Accredited Professional for this project, elaborates on the water-saving measures, which include retrofitting taps and other water fittings throughout the building. This process required engagement with tenants to get their buy-in for the retrofitting process and ongoing water-saving habits.

Harms further explains that the existing basement seepage water is harnessed and fed to an “oversized” reverse-osmosis filtration and treatment system that produces potable water quality, making it the first building to claim basement seepage water as an alternative water source. This required a Credit Interpretation Request (CIR) to be developed. “It was a challenging process”, says Harms, “involving water specialists, GBCSA and industry members to alter the definition of sustainable alternative water sources due to the severity of the Cape Town drought [at the time]”. Because of the scale of this operation, 100% of the building’s own potable water requirements are satisfied with water to spare. Excess water can be trucked to other locations as required. “In Cape Town, and other regions of South Africa, we find ourselves in an increasingly water-constrained environment”, Harms says. “It is especially vital that property owners and building operators deeply concern themselves with mitigation and adaptation measures while taking accountability for their own water supply and water-supply resilience. A Net-Zero water strategy and certification, together with the requisite suite of interventions, exemplifies this on a building and precinct level”.

Growthpoint’s Werner van Antwerpen echoes this as he explains Growthpoint’s commitments to water efficiency within its portfolio. “We have a water intensity target of 0.5l/m²/annum across our portfolio”, he says, “and this certification was particularly important in Cape Town as they faced the Day Zero crisis”. As with all modelled certifications, recertification is required every three years. The recertification, which was due in 2021, was delayed due to reinstated regulations by the City Council. Growthpoint is addressing items identified during plant inspections. Requirements include meters measuring how much unusable water is disposed of, as well as regulatory tank and pipe signage. To date, the outstanding matters pertain to documentation requirements. Thereafter, monthly test samples are required to demonstrate water quality compliance.

A positive future

As real projects have started to achieve targets that once seemed impossible, we can start to raise the bar, aim for higher goals, and enter the realm of Climate Positive Tomorrow. In the words of Vanessa Drummond, “We must! Our children, children’s children, you and I depend on it. Join me on this journey; it’s not too late to start.”