Singapore, 14 May 2015 – City Developments Limited (CDL) continues to lead the green building movement as the most-awarded developer, across the private and public sectors, at the Building and Construction Authority (BCA) Awards 2015 Ceremony to be held this evening. CDL has garnered 36 accolades, up from 30 in 2014, including the top honours Quality Excellence Award – Quality Champion (Platinum) for the third consecutive year. CDL is the only developer to have attained this highest tier for its sustained leadership and commitment in delivering quality homes.
In line with BCA’s 3rd Green Building Masterplan, CDL has also emerged the biggest winner of the inaugural Green Mark Pearl Award for developers and building owners that actively engage tenants to use less energy through changes in behaviour and daily operations. CDL has garnered three out of the seven awards under this category, and its City House building is the sole winner of the top-tier Pearl Prestige Award. In addition, for the Construction Productivity Awards’ Projects category, all three Platinum accolades have been won by CDL’s developments.
CDL’s Deputy Chairman Mr Kwek Leng Joo said, “Sustainable development has increasingly become a national priority as Singapore has limited land and lacks natural resources. With a growing and highly urbanised population, businesses face numerous challenges such as the need to raise productivity and increased expectations for corporate environmental stewardship to mitigate climate change. Greening buildings is key to realising our vision of a clean, green, sustainable and smart nation.”
“Beyond brick and mortar, the building sector as a whole must continually seek green innovations, sustainable engineering solutions and more efficient use of resources. With the collective effort of all stakeholders, the drive for sustainable development will be pushed a notch higher.”
BCA CEO Dr John Keung said, “For two decades, CDL has been a visionary industry leader, setting new benchmarks in high quality and sustainable buildings. With its strong and unwavering leadership commitment, CDL has distinguished itself as the most-awarded developer in the BCA Awards 2015. Through innovative technologies, CDL has greatly raised productivity, safety excellence and workmanship. CDL has also pioneered effective engagement initiatives to transform mindsets, influence occupant behaviour and foster greater stakeholder collaboration. These efforts have paved the way forward for a future-ready built environment in Singapore.”
Engaging Stakeholders for Greener Buildings
As one of Singapore’s biggest landlords, CDL has set a target to achieve a minimum of BCA Green Mark GoldPlus for all existing buildings since 2011. CDL has also worked in tandem with its commercial tenants to achieve greater environmental sustainability.
This year, CDL’s City House in the Central Business District, has been conferred the Green Mark Pearl Prestige Award, while Manulife Centre along Bras Basah Road and 7 & 9 Tampines Grande have received the Green Mark Pearl Award.
Beyond retrofitting City House with a more energy-efficient chiller plant, CDL has engaged tenants of this Green Mark Platinum building through initiatives such as the “1⁰C Up” Programme to reduce energy usage by raising the air-conditioning temperature. Since 2009, City House has achieved 100% tenant participation for this initiative. Tenants also received kits with practical tips to green fit their premises and were encouraged to recycle. Moreover, City House has several green features such as motion sensors along common areas and water-efficient fittings. The building has achieved annual energy savings of about 1.9 million kWh (equivalent to about S$500,000* annually).
At Manulife Centre, some of the environmentally-friendly features include efficient lighting at common areas, hybrid car park lots and water efficient shower facilities. At Tampines Grande, one of the tenants, ING Singapore, has embraced green practices by using recycled paper for general office printing, advocating the use of recycled furniture, and encouraging employees to bike rent and cycle instead of driving during lunch hours.
Since September 2014, CDL has also progressively implemented its Green Lease Partnership programme. As of April 2015, close to 80% of its commercial tenants have signed the CDL Green Lease Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), pledging to monitor and reduce energy consumption.
As an incentive, CDL has introduced a 1% electricity rebate for commercial tenants who attain 2% savings over the last quarter’s bill. CDL also partnered Tuas Power to develop a digital monitoring portal that provides real-time half hourly updates of energy consumption. Tenants can access the portal conveniently via mobile devices to better track and manage their electricity usage.
To further incentivise commercial tenants that participate in the Green Mark for Office Interior (GMOI) scheme, CDL undertook the cost of replacing T8 light fittings with the more energy-efficient T5 models at their premises, with an estimated total energy savings of over 45,000 kWh per year (equivalent to over S$11,000* annually).
Raising Productivity through Game Changing Technologies
CDL has continuously explored ways to build in a more productive and sustainable manner. For this year’s Construction Productivity Awards’ Projects category, all three Platinum winners are CDL’s condominiums – Tree House at Chestnut Ave, and 368 Thomson and Cube 8 both at Thomson Rd.
At Tree House, for instance, a 2,289 m2 vertical garden, which achieved a Guinness World Record, was assembled using various prefabricated components instead of being constructed from scratch onsite. Thus, no scaffolding, formworks, concreting or reinforcement bars were required onsite to construct the world’s largest vertical garden. This led to estimated manpower savings of 50%, productivity increase of about 78%, less wastage of materials and a lower risk of worksite accidents.
Moving forward, in 2015, CDL will be the first in Asia to apply the advanced construction technology, Prefabricated Prefinished Volumetric Construction (PPVC), for a large scale residential project. Over 5,000 building modules will be used to construct an Executive Condominium, The Brownstone, at Canberra Drive, Sembawang. Likely the world’s largest PPVC application of its kind, it is expected to boost construction productivity by more than 40% and save some 55,000 man days.
Since 2011, CDL has also raised its target to achieve BCA Green Mark GoldPlus for all new developments, above the mandatory Green Mark certification level. To date, CDL has over 80 Green Mark certified developments and office interiors, of which 33 attained the highest Green Mark Platinum rating.
*Based on 2014’s average electricity tariff of S$0.2559.