Abstracto

Localized Green Building Standards: The Anti-Globalization Thesis

Ayman M. Ismail, Maged M. Abo Elela, Eman B. Ahmed

Despite going global, LEED certification is essentially a US tailored approach to encourage Green Building businesses and practices. The assumptions of incentive packages and tax breaks, points rewarded for the use of certain types of recycling, weights and points – all these have many local biases for US companies and practices. Before adoption in another country, these assumptions and biases have to be clearly spelled out and checked. In fact, a Green Building certification has to be home-grown to suit economical, cultural and technological conditions. This paper shows how different countries can adopt a customized Green Building Evaluation Code and still be recognized, the case study is Egypt Green Pyramid ranking system. The research aims to evaluate the adoption of the green building systems in Egypt and propose the suitable score and elements to the Egyptian society. Some localized issues for example are the increased encroachment on agricultural land, the abundant desert land, energy crisis and the reduced share of Nile water.