Towards a successful voluntary building environmental assessment scheme

Voluntary building assessment schemes have emerged worldwide to help assess the environmental performance of buildings. As building environmental assessment is a rapidly evolving field, the scope and details of such assessment schemes are continuously undergoing updating and refinement. Substantial efforts have been devoted to the design and improvement of the assessment schemes to make them capable of defining an objective building profile. Although most of the existing schemes are voluntary, many fail to encourage participation of the building investors and designers. In order to widen acceptance, the design of the scheme should be oriented towards the manner in which investors make decisions. This paper provides an overview of the vital elements and changes needed, so as to make a voluntary building environmental assessment scheme more attractive and successful, and will include reforms not only in the scope and the credit weighting philosophy but also in its nature.