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Mateus 2011 - Sustainability Assessment and Rating of Buildings Developing The Methodology
Mateus 2011 - Sustainability Assessment and Rating of Buildings Developing The Methodology
a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t
Article history: Although sustainable building is a multidimensional concept, attention to the issue often focuses solely
Received 1 October 2010 on environmental indicators, ignoring the substantial importance of social, economic and cultural
Received in revised form indicators. Building sustainability involves various relations between built, natural and social systems
18 March 2011
and therefore comprises a complex of different priorities that require consideration at each stage of
Accepted 5 April 2011
a building’s life-cycle. To cope with this complexity and to support sustainability systematic, holistic and
practical approaches to building design need to be developed. The main objective of a systematic
Keywords:
methodology is to support the development of a building design that achieves the most appropriate
Building sustainability assessment
Life-cycle
balance between the different sustainability dimensions, and is, at the same time, practical, transparent
Rating and flexible enough to be easily adapted to different types of buildings and technology.
Sustainability It is the aim of this paper to present an innovative approach for developing building sustainability
assessment and rating, and to contribute to the evolution of generic methodology and international
understanding by introducing an approach which takes the different dimensions of sustainability into
account. The scope of the methodology presented in this paper (SBToolPTeH) is to assess the sustain-
ability of existing, new and renovated residential buildings in urban areas, specifically in the Portuguese
context.
Ó 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
0360-1323/$ e see front matter Ó 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.buildenv.2011.04.023
R. Mateus, L. Bragança / Building and Environment 46 (2011) 1962e1971 1963
renewable materials and water, as well as the production of emis- developed through the collaborative work of representatives from
sions, waste and pollutants. The following goals are those most often 20 countries [11]; and the Leadership in Energy and Environmental
found on building project agendas: optimization of site potential; Design (LEEDÒ), developed in the U.S.A. [12]. In general, these
preservation of regional and cultural identity; minimization of methods are characterized by assessing a number of partial
energy consumption; protection and conservation of water building features and aggregating these results into an environ-
resources; use of environmentally friendly materials and products; mental rating or sustainability score [13].
healthy and convenient indoor climate, and optimized operational In the SBTool the approach is to weight different indicators,
and maintenance practices [6]. To attain these goals and to support taking into account weighting factors that are fixed at the national
a sustainable building design, systematic, holistic and practical level. Each “score” is the result of the comparison between the
approaches must be properly implemented. Developing and using studied building and the national reference. This scheme allows an
building sustainability assessment methods is one solution to international comparison of buildings from different countries.
explore in order to promote a more sustainable built environment. Other tools, for instance, BREEAM and LEED, are based upon credits.
The following paragraphs will present an innovative approach The maximum number of credits available for each indicator is
for developing building sustainability assessment and rating and related to its weight in the overall score, which is expressed by
contribute to the evolution of generic methodology and inter- a rating (e.g. from Pass to Excellent in BREEAM).
national understanding by introducing an approach which takes There are also LCA-based tools available that are especially
the different dimensions of sustainability into account. This developed to address the building as whole, such as, for example,
approach is based on the state-of-the-art in building sustain- Eco-Quantum (Netherlands) [14], EcoEffect (Sweden) [15], Env-
ability assessment, including the latest developments archived by est2 (U.K.) [16], BEES 4.0 (U.S.) [17] and ATHENA (Canada) [18]. In
the above mentioned standardization bodies and in other inter- the existing literature, comparative studies of contextual and
national fora. methodological aspects of tools have been made, for example,
Forsberg and Malmborg [19]. Haapio and Viitaniemi [1] also per-
1.1. The state-of-the-art on sustainability assessment methodologies formed a study that analysed and categorised a group of sixteen
environmental impact assessment tools. The majority of these
The purpose of sustainability assessments is to gather and report tools are developed according to a bottomeup approach, i.e.
information for decision-making during the different phases of a combination of building materials and components add up to
construction, design and use of a building. The sustainability scores a building, even though they are designed to consider the whole
or profiles based on indicators result from a process in which the building, including energy demand, etc [20]. Tools to support
relevant phenomena are identified, analyzed and valued. At present, decision-making in accordance with principles of performance-
it is possible to identify two opposite trends at work in the process: based design have also been developed, mainly in research
on the one hand, the indicators commonly used by the different communities.
operators are characterised by their complexity and diversity while, Sustainability assessment tools are constantly evolving in order
on the other hand, there is a growing movement towards better to overcome their various limitations. The main goal, at present, is
usability through common understanding and simplicity. to develop and implement a systematic methodology to support
Building sustainability assessments based on a life-cycle a building design which achieves the most appropriate balance
approach can produce important long-term benefits for both between the different sustainability dimensions, and which is, at
building owners and occupants [7], namely: helping to minimize the same time, practical, transparent and flexible enough to be
environmental impacts; solving existing building problems; creating easily adapted to different kinds of buildings and to the constant
healthier, more comfortable and more productive indoor spaces, and evolution of technology. There are many countries that already
reducing building operation and maintenance costs. Life-cycle have or are in the process of developing domestic assessment
analysis considers all the inputs and outputs of acquiring, owning, methods, which means that examples of international exchange
and disposing of a building system. This approach is particularly and coordination are increasingly evident.
useful when project alternatives, which fulfil the same performance Sustainability assessments are usually based on indicators.
requirements, but differ with respect to initial costs and operating These indicators provide information about the main influences
costs, have to be compared in order to select the one that maximizes of the industry as a whole and about the impacts of construction
net savings [7]. and operation of buildings and other built assets [21]. In trying to
The development of assessment methods and the respective establish a list of generally accepted indicators, it seems that
tools is a challenge both for the academia and in practice. An issue development leads to different parameters and weighting factors
of prime importance is that of managing the flows of information in different countries [22]. This finding can be regarded as a real
and knowledge between the various levels of indicator systems. response to the actual needs of decision-making as both the
An important constraint to these methods is that the specific essential indicators and their weights are highly dependent on
definition of the terms “sustainable building” or “high perfor- the environmental, social and economic contexts of their use.
mance building” is complex, since different actors in the building’s
life-cycle have different interests and requirements [8]. For 1.2. The ongoing standardisation work
instance, promoters will give more attention to economic issues,
whereas the end users are more interested in health and comfort The use of a different list of indicators in different approaches
issues [1]. makes a definition of the term, “Sustainable Construction”, subjective
During the last two decades a significant number of environ- and causes difficulties in comparing results from different tools. In
mental and sustainability assessment tools for buildings have been order to overcome these constraints, both the International Organi-
developed. The first commercially available environmental assess- zation for Standardization (ISO) and the European Committee for
ment tool for buildings was the Building Research Establishment Standardization (CEN) have worked actively in the last few years to
Assessment Method (BREAM) [9,10]. This method was established define standard requirements for the environmental and sustain-
in the UK in 1990 and together with the following two rating and ability assessments of buildings.
certification systems it provides the basis for the other approaches As a result of the ISO Technical Committee (TC) 59, “Building
used throughout the world: Sustainable Building Tool (SBTool), construction”, and its Subcommittee (SC) 17, “Sustainability in
1964 R. Mateus, L. Bragança / Building and Environment 46 (2011) 1962e1971
building construction”, four new technical specifications and stan- promote further sustainable design, construction, operation and
dards were published: maintenance of buildings.
two benchmarks: conventional practice and best practice. Further- assess the objectives of a project. Each category is defined by
more, this methodology is also able to compare performance at the a number of indicators and each indicator is defined by a number of
level of a particular sustainability category in various construction parameters.
projects. After analyzing the main characteristics of several building
sustainability assessment systems in different countries and
2.2. Boundaries of assessment studying the local context, authors defined nine categories for the
assessment tool. A category is a global indicator that summarises
Most of the Portuguese construction market is related to the the performance of a building at the level of a key-sustainability
residential sector. This study therefore prioritises the development aspect. SBToolPT has nine sustainability categories (Table 1): C1 e
of a methodology to support and to rate sustainable residential Climate change and outdoor air quality; C2 e Land use and biodi-
buildings. versity; C3 e Energy Efficiency; C4 e Materials and waste
The object of assessment is the building, including its founda- management; C5 e Water efficiency; C6 e Occupant’s health and
tions and external works, within the area of the building site. The comfort; C7 e Accessibilities; C8 e Education and awareness of
impacts of the building upon its surroundings and the urban sustainability; and C9 e Life-cycle costs. Each assessment category
environment are not considered. Some authors have concluded is identified by one or more indicators.
that restricted scales of study (corresponding to a single building An indicator is a sign or a signal that relays a complex message,
for example) are too limited to correctly take into account from potentially numerous sources, in a simple and useful manner
sustainable development objectives [35]. Nevertheless, sustainable [36]. Therefore, the three main objectives of the indicators are:
urban planning is normally limited to municipalities and regional simplification, quantification and communication [37]. SBToolPTeH
authorities and therefore it is more rational and straightforward to has a total of twenty-five indicators (Table 1). The number and
limit the physical system boundary to the building itself (or part of nature of the indicators vary from one category to another according
it) together with the site. As a result, the methodology excludes to the category itself and its importance to the Portuguese context.
construction works outside the construction site (including The list of indicators is based on the commonly accepted life-cycle
networks for communication, energy, and transportation). The use assessment (LCA) methods, the main indicators used in several
of this boundary is in accordance with prEN 15643-2:2009 [30]. building sustainability assessment systems in different countries
The time boundary should represent the whole life-cycle stages (mainly in the international SBTool method), and in the ongoing
of a building. In a new building, all life-cycle stages, from
construction to final disposal, are considered; and in existing Table 1
buildings, the temporal boundary is marked from the moment of List of categories and sustainability indicators for the SBToolPTeH methodology.
intervention until to the final disposal. Dimension Categories Sustainability indicators
Environment C1 e Climate change P1 e Construction materials’
2.3. Structure and assessment steps and outdoor air quality embodied environmental
impact
The methodology is supported by an assessment guide and the C2 e Land use and P2 e Urban density
biodiversity P3 e Water permeability of the
assessment procedure follows four steps (Fig. 1):
development
P4 e Use of pre-developed land
i) Quantification of performance of the building at the level of P5 e Use of local flora
each indicator; P6 e Heat-island effect
ii) Normalization of parameters; C3 e Energy efficiency P7 e Primary energy
P8 e In-situ energy production
iii) Aggregation of parameters; from renewable sources
iv) Sustainable score calculation and global assessment. C4 e Materials and P9 e Materials and products
waste management reused
P10 e Use of materials with
recycled content
2.4. Sustainability categories, indicators and parameters P11 e Use of certified organic
materials
After defining the boundaries the next step was to define the P12 e Use of cement substitutes
categories, indicators and related parameters within the three in concrete
P13 e Waste management
sustainable development dimensions that were going to be used to
during operation
C5 e Water efficiency P14 e Fresh water consumption
P15 e Reuse of grey and
rainwater
work at the CEN TC350 standardization body. In addition, each using the SimaPro software [39] and Table 2 presents the LCA
indicator is defined according to a number of parameters. A param- methods used.
eter is a measurable or observable property which provides infor- Fig. 2 presents how the information is organized in the LCA
mation about a phenomenon/environment/area with a significance database for a building component and both the list of environ-
extending beyond that directly associated with a value [38]. As an mental indicators and LCA methods used to quantify it [40]. The
example, the parameter used in SBToolPTeH to measure the functional unit used for the building components database is one
performance at the level of indicator “P7 e Primary Energy” is the square metre (m2) of area and one unit of mass (kg) for the mate-
annual primary energy (in kilogram of oil equivalents per square rials database.
meter of net area) used for heating, cooling and hot water produc- At the level of social performance, the assessment guide pres-
tion, according to the Portuguese thermal regulation methodology. ents the analytical methods that should be used to quantify the
Indicators and related parameters are the basis of the methodology, parameters. If the assessment is being carried out during the
since objectives and results will be conditioned by them. building operation, in-situ measurements can also be used.
This methodology has a total of nine sustainability categories Measuring the economic performance of a building is more
and twenty-five sustainability indicators within the three sustain- straightforward than measuring, for instance, the environmental
ability dimensions. performance. Standardized methodologies and quantitative pub-
In SBToolPT, assessment of embodied impacts related to building lished data are readily available for the Portuguese context.
materials is based on the same list of environmental impacts Economic performance is based on the market value of the dwell-
expressed by the impact categories of LCA, which are normally ings and on their operational costs (costs relating to water and
declared in the Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs). The list energy consumption).
of environmental categories and environmental parameters was
extended so that it would be possible, in a holistic approach, to
2.6. Normalization and aggregation
access the main life-cycle environmental impacts, according to
national priorities. Therefore, the methodology uses a list of fifteen
The objective of the normalization of parameters is to avoid
parameters and considers all the environmental impacts expressed
scale effects in the aggregation of parameters inside each indicator
by the impact categories of LCA as well as all environmental aspects
and to solve the problem of some of the parameters being of the
expressed by data derived from LCI and not assigned to the impact
type “higher is better” and others being “lower is better”.
categories of LCA that are listed in the prEN 15643-2:2009 [30].
Normalization was done using Diaz-Balteiro [41] Equation (1).
The list of social parameters includes three categories and eight
parameters. This list was developed in order to include the main Pi P*i
aspects of the building occupants’ health and comfort and includes Pi ¼ ci (1)
Pi* P*i
other aspects relating to the mobility of building occupants and
their access to the main urban amenities. It also reflects the func- In this equation, Pi is the value of ith parameter. Pi* and P*i are
tional requirements of a residential building, according to national the best and worst values of the ith sustainable parameter. The best
building codes. A further important aspect that is also considered value of a parameter represents the best practice in use in the
here is the occupants’ education and awareness of sustainability, Portuguese building sector and the worst value represents the
since the real performance of a building, during the operation standard practice or the minimum legal requirement. These
phase, is largely dependent on the occupants’ behaviour. benchmarks are updated in an annual basis or whenever a new
The economic performance indicators were defined in order to regulation enters into force.
include the most relevant life-cycle costs. This list therefore In addition to making the value of the parameters considered in
includes two indicators: one for the costs of the building up until the assessment dimensionless, normalization converts the values
the end of the construction phase and another for the costs (energy between best and conventional practices into a scale bounded
and water) during the operation phase. Operation cost is the Net between 0 (worst value) and 1 (best value). A building design which
Present Value (NPV) of energy and water costs calculated on annual performance is above the best practice benchmarks will have
basis and assuming a life-cycle of at least fifty years. a score above 1 and performances below the conventional will have
a negative normalized value. This equation is valid for both situa-
tions: “higher is better” and “lower is better”.
2.5. Quantification of parameters For example, the normalization of the primary energy used for
heating (hot water heating included) was done as presented in
The assessment guide presents the methodologies that should Table 3 and Equation (2).
be used by the assessor in order to quantify the performance of the
building at the level of each sustainability indicator. Table 2
To facilitate the quantification of environmental performance, Environmental impact categories declared in the built-in LCA database for building
SBToolPT uses the same environmental categories declared in the technologies.
Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs). However, there are, at Environmental impact categories Unit/declared unit LCA methods
present, some limitations to this approach due to the scarcity of Depletion of abiotic resources [kg Sb equiv.] CML 2 baseline 2000
available EPDs. The solution proposed to overcome this problem Global warming potential (GWP) [Kg CO2 equiv.] IPCC 2001 GWP 100a
was to develop and use databases with the LCA data for the most Destruction of atmospheric [Kg CFC-11 equiv.] CML 2 baseline 2000
commonly used building materials and components. Therefore, this ozone (ODP)
Acidification potential (AP) [Kg SO2 equiv.] CML 2 baseline 2000
methodology includes an LCA database that is continuously upda-
Eutrophication potential (NP) [Kg PO4 equiv.] CML 2 baseline 2000
ted and covers: common building technologies for each building Photochemical ozone [Kg C2H4 equiv.] CML 2 baseline 2000
element (floors, walls, roofs, windows and doors); the most creation (POCP)
commonly used building materials; and the impacts from the Non-renewable primary energy [MJ equiv.] Cumulative Energy
operation of the most common HVAC equipment. This database Demand
Renewable primary energy [MJ equiv.] Cumulative Energy
covers the six environmental impact categories presented in Demand
Table 2. The environmental impact categories were quantified
R. Mateus, L. Bragança / Building and Environment 46 (2011) 1962e1971 1967
Eh Eh* 100 140 Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) method, among others [7]. The
Eh ¼ ¼ ¼ 0:38 (2) final result should be obtained by considering the advantages and
Eh* Eh* 35 140
avoiding the constraints of each method [7]. Such a process implies
As presented in Table 4, the normalized values of each param- subjective weighting, which is subject to a number of shortcomings,
eter are converted into a graded scale bounded between E (less as discussed, for instance, by Finnveden [43].
sustainable/below the conventional practice) and Aþ (more The methodology uses a complete aggregation method for each
sustainable/above the best practice) in order to facilitate the indicator, according to Equation (3).
interpretation of results. In this graded scale, level D is equivalent to
the conventional practice and A to the best practice. The graded X
n
Nj ¼ wi $Pi (3)
scale was defined assuming a linear evolution in the building
i¼1
performance between the upper limit of grade D and grade A. This
methodology considers that a building which performance is until The indicator Nj is the result of the weighting average of all the
10% higher than the conventional practice has a similar perfor- normalized parameters Pi ; wi is the weight of the ith parameter. The
mance to a conventional one. sum of all weights must be equal to 1.
Although building sustainability assessment crosses different Difficulties in this method lie in the setting of the weight of each
fields and involves the use of numerous indicators and parameters, parameter and in the possible compensation between parameters.
in the communication of the global evaluation of a design approach, Since weights are strongly linked to the objectives of the project
the use of a long list of indicators with their associated levels of and to the relative importance of each parameter in the assessment
performance is useless. The reasoning for this is the fact that if the of each indicator, higher weights must be adopted for parameters of
performance is communicated using several grades it is difficult to major importance in the project. In this approach, the possible
understand the overall performance and therefore to compare compensation between parameters is limited inside each indicator.
different design approaches. To overcome this, the best method is The following aspects have been considered in the development
to combine indicators within each category and sustainability of the system of weights:
dimension in order to obtain the respective performance levels
[42]. Consequently, the inclusion of a weighting system of indica- - The system of weights of other building sustainability assess-
tors is a necessary stage in the process of developing assessment ment methodologies: the work included an analysis of the
tools. This system can define the importance of each indicator main methodologies in order to indentify the parameters of
according to the local context in which the tool is developed [7]. greatest importance;
This process should consider and integrate different methodol-
ogies such as: Experts panel, Endpoint method, Economy method,
Table 4
Table 3 Conversion of the quantitative normalized parameters into a qualitative
Example of benchmarking for normalization. graded scale.
Table 6
Weight of each environmental indicator and category in the assessment of environmental performance (NA).
Table 7
Weight of each social indicator and category in the assessment of the social performance (NS).
to work with. Therefore, the last step of the methodology is to researchers in the area, leading to the publication of some impor-
calculate the sustainable score (NG). The NG is a single index that tant conference and journal papers in recent years. To date, scoring
represents the global sustainability performance of a building; it is of the indicator systems is best developed in methods that use
evaluated using Equation (5). environmental information for single properties like LCA tools.
These tools may be linked to different phases of the building design
NG ¼ wA NA þ wS NS þ wC NC (5) process, from the initial definition or technical design phase to
Where, NG is the sustainability score, Nj is the performance at the a building in use, in order to obtain an overall picture of the
level of the dimension j and wj is the weight of the dimension jth. attainment of sustainability targets. These include tools for the
The weight of the environment, society and economy dimen- performance-based design and building approach and other
sions in the assessment of global performance is, respectively, 40%, building rating schemes.
30% and 30%. This value considers the following aspects: the The whole-building evaluation may also be done on the basis of
importance of environmental issues for the survival of human performance of the completed building with respect to its space,
beings and other species; the harmonious coexistence between the structural and technical systems and their interaction. The tools
three sustainability dimensions, according to the sustainable available are, for example, modelling of energy flows, lighting and
development aims; and the opinions of academic experts, accessible routes.
construction stakeholders and building users. Although there are subjective aspects to the majority of
The labelling system for the SBToolPT methodology is similar to assessment tools, hindering their adoption, they still have an
that used in the existing labelling schemes such as the EU energy important role to play, not only in evaluating the impacts of an
labelling scheme for white goods and the European DisplayTM actual building, but also, and even more importantly, in guiding the
Campaign posters [47]. In this study, however, due to the possible appropriate design for the attainment of performance objectives.
compensation between categories, the global performance of The greatest constraint to sustainability assessment is that assess-
a building is not communicated by using only the overall score. In ment involves subjective rating and depends above all on the
this methodology the performance of a building is measured planned function of the building, as well as on its socio-economic
against each category, each of the three sustainable dimensions and and cultural heritage context. Additionally, one of the most
the global performance (sustainable score). Building performance important aspects influencing the results is the list of indicators and
is ranked on a scale from Aþ to E. Fig. 3 represent the output of the their respective parameters, since the result relies on the perfor-
SBToolPT methodology for a hypothetical case study at the level of mance obtained in each indicator. The definition of a list of indi-
the sustainability dimensions and global score. cators and respective parameters to be adopted on an international
From the outputs of this building sustainability assessment scale is one solution to explore in order to make the evaluation
method it is possible to monitor and compare the performance of methods more objective.
the solution in study with the benchmarks of the methodology: Another important constraint is that although there are several
conventional solution (D grade) and best practice (A grade). The recognized LCA tools, most building sustainability assessment and
nearer to grade Aþ the performance of the solution is, the more rating systems are not comprehensive or consistently LCA-based. The
sustainable it is. If the solution shows a grade E in one parameter or reasons for this failure are above all related to the complexity of the
category, it has obviously performed worse than the reference stages of an LCA. Besides being complex, the LCA approach is also very
solution at that level, therefore identifying an issue that requires time consuming and therefore mainly used by experts at academic
special attention. levels. For these reasons most of the building sustainability assess-
ment methods rely on single material proprieties or attributes, such
as recycled content, recycling potential or distances travelled from
3. Discussion
the point of manufacture [48]. This situation causes some distortion
in both the interpretation of the results from the environmental
The usability, reliability and fitness for purpose of the different
performance assessment and the comparison of these results with
sustainability assessment tools has been carefully evaluated by
different building sustainability assessment and rating systems.
Due to the above mentioned reasons, and despite numerous
Table 8
studies in the area of building sustainability assessment, there is
Weight of each economic indicator and category in the assessment of economic
performance (NE). a lack of a commonly accepted methodology to assist architects and
engineers in the design, construction and refurbishing stages of
Categories Sustainability Weight (%) of Weight (%) of
a building. Nevertheless, in spite of the limitations of the different
indicators the indicator the category
methods, the increasingly widespread use of assessment methods
C9 e Life-cycle costs P24 e Capital cost 50 100
P25 e Operational cost 50
is having direct and indirect impacts on the promotion of sustain-
able building design. Many countries either have or are in the
1970 R. Mateus, L. Bragança / Building and Environment 46 (2011) 1962e1971
Fig. 3. SBToolPT output for a hypothetical building e performance of the solution presented at the level of the three sustainable dimensions and the sustainable score.
process of developing domestic assessment methods, which is transparency is useful both to designers and end users and is
making the need for international exchange and coordination essential for greater objectivity in the assessment process.
increasingly relevant. Sustainability in the building sector has
gained an international forum and the Green Building Challenge,
4. Conclusions
for example, is organizing several major international conferences
which are having a noticeably positive effect on the promotion of
The sustainable design, construction and use of buildings are
this concept. Furthermore, both the International Organization of
based on the best trade-off between environmental pressure
Standardization (ISO) and the European Committee for Standardi-
(relating to environmental impacts), social aspects (relating to
zation (CEN) are making important progress towards the stan-
users’ comfort and other social benefits) and economic aspects
dardization of sustainability indicators and horizontal methods in
(relating to life-cycle costs). Sustainable design strives for greater
building sustainability assessment.
compatibility between the artificial and the natural environments
This paper has attempted to present an approach to building
without compromising the functional requirements of the build-
sustainability assessment that can contribute to the evolution of
ings and the associated costs.
generic methodology. The methodology is based on the actual
Many countries either have or are in the process of developing
limitations of the existing building sustainability assessment
domestic assessment methods, which makes the need for interna-
methods and on the work currently being developed in interna-
tional exchange and coordination increasingly relevant. This paper
tional fora, including standardization bodies.
contributes to the evolution of generic methodology and interna-
The methodology presented in this paper (SBToolPTeH) is
tional understanding by introducing an approach that takes the
intended to foster more sustainable building design, construction,
different dimensions of sustainability into account and incorporates
operation, maintenance and disassembly/deconstruction by
a standardised LCA method to assess the environmental dimension.
promoting and making possible a better integration of environ-
This paper presented the SBToolPTeH methodology, whose
mental, societal, functional and cost concerns with other traditional
scope is to assess the sustainability of existing, new and renovated
decision criteria. This methodology can be used to support the
residential buildings in urban areas, specifically in the Portuguese
sustainable design, since it defines the sustainable construction
context. Although this paper only presented the SBToolPT module to
concept through a list of sustainability indicators and related
assess the sustainability of residential buildings, the approach used
performance objectives. Additionally it can be used to evaluate the
in the other modules is based in the same framework.
overall sustainability performance. According to this methodology,
SBToolPT methodology is intended to boost sustainable building
a sustainable building is the one which performance is optimized at
in Portugal. It supports steps towards sustainable design and
the level of the twenty five indicators presented in Table 1 and has
construction through the definition of a list of objectives that are
an overall average performance level at least 10% higher than the
easily understandable by all intervenients in the construction
conventional building practice.
market and is compatible with the Portuguese construction tech-
SBToolPTeH is based on the international SBTool approach, since
nology context.
it uses the same core indicators and normalization system to assess
the sustainability of a building (the performance of a building is
compared with two benchmarks: best practice and conventional References
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