Develop a flexible method to assess buildings hosting major sports events environmentally through the world

Peer review under responsibility of Housing and Building National Research Center.

Figures & data

Table 1 Some comparative aspects between BREEAM, LEED, green star and CASBEE for multi-residential buildings in the same time period [7–^[8]9,15,16].

Comparative aspects	BREEAM	LEED	Green star	CASBEE
Producer	BRE	USGBC	GBCA	JaGBC-JSBC
Evaluation areas and points obtained	2008/upgraded 2010	2009/upgraded 2011	2009 upgraded 2011	2010
	Management (10)	Awareness & education (3)	Building Management (18)	Quality of services (16.6%)
	Health and wellbeing (12)	Indoor Environmental Quality (21)	Indoor Environment Quality (20)	Indoor Environment (16.6%)
	Energy (23)	Energy & Atmosphere (38)	Energy (26)	Energy (16.6%)
	Transport (9)	Location & Linkages (10)	Transport (14)
	Water (8)	Water Efficiency (15)	Water (12)	Resources & Materials (16.6%)
	Materials (17)	Materials & Resources (16)	Materials (31)
	Waste (8)
	Land use and ecology (10)	Sustainable Sites (22)	Land use & Ecology (11)	Outdoor environment on site (16.6%)
	Pollution (12)		Emissions (18)	Off-site environment (16.6%)
	Innovation (10)	Innovation & Design Process (11)	Innovation (5)
Classifications and related grades	Pass (30–45%)	Certified (45–59 point)	4 stars (45–59%)	Poor-C (0–0.49)
	Good (45–55%)	Silver (60–74 point)	5 stars (60–59%)	Fairly poor-B^− (0.5–0.99)
	V good (55–70%)	Gold (75–89 point)	6 stars (75–105%)	Good-B^+(1–1.49)
	Excellent (70–85%)	Platinum (90–136 point)		Very good- A (1.5–1.99)
	Outstanding (85–110%)			Excellent-S (0.3−)
Used legislation	European and UK regulations	American regulations especially ASHRAE	Australian legislation and local protocols	Japanese legislation and codes

Fig. 1 Approximate values for different assessment methods used to assess buildings designed in the United Kingdom [5].

Table 2 Some different aspects between some versions of LEED which lead to the difficulty of comparing their assessment results [16,17].

Some LEED aspects	Some versions of LEED
	Multi-residential 2005	Multi-residential-2009	Multi-residential-2011
Evaluation areas and points can be obtained	Sustainable Sites (SS) (14)	Sustainable Sites (SS) (26)	Innovation & Design Process (11)
	Water Efficiency (WE) (5)	Water Efficiency (WE) (10)
	Energy & Atmosphere (EA) (17)	Energy & Atmosphere (EA) (35)	Location & Linkages (LL) (10)
			Sustainable Sites (SS) (22)
	Materials & Resources (MR) (13)	Materials & Resources (MR) (14)	Water Efficiency (WE) (15)
			Energy & Atmosphere (EA) (38)
	Indoor Environmental Quality (EQ) (15)	Indoor Environmental Quality (EQ) (15)	Materials and Resources (MR) (16)
	Innovation & Design Process (ID) (5)	Innovation & Design Process (ID) (6)	Indoor Environmental Quality (EQ) (21)
		Regional Priority (RP) (4)	Awareness & Education (AE) (3)
Classifications and related grades	Certified (26–32 point)	Certified (40–49 point)	Certified (45–59 point)
	Silver (33–38 point)	Silver (50–59 point)	Silver (60–74 point)
	Gold (39–51 point)	Gold (60–79 point)	Gold (75–89 point)
	Platinum (52–69 point)	Platinum (89–110 point)	Platinum (90–136 point)

Table 3 Simplified example of determining the presence and the mandatory number of items according to variables’ effect.

Item no.	Presence	Mandatory
Item 1	Y	M
Item 2	Y	–
Item 3	Y	–
Item 4	Y	–

Table 4 Simplified example of determining the weight of an item according to some variables that could affect it.

Item no.	Initial weight	Variables affecting the item’s weight (e.g.)	Type of impact	Degree of impact (DI)^a	Degree of variable importance (DVI)^b	Final weight^c
Item 1	2%	V1 (climate)	+	10	5	13.5% ^d
		V2 (surrounding urban)	−	4	6
		V3 (historic fetchers)	−	3	2
		V4 (population density)	+	4	1

a (DI) is a number that experts put from 1 to 10 to express the amount of variable impact on the item’s weight, number 1 expresses the lowest impact.

b (DVI) is a number that experts put from 1 to 10 to express the degree of variable importance in relation to other variables affecting the same item; number 1 expresses the highest importance.

c The mathematical equation used to get the final weight is: Final weight = Initial weight + ((DI for V1/DVI for V1) × type of impact × 3%) + ((DI for V2/DVI for V2) × type of impact × 3%) + ...etc. Noting that the figure 3% (proposed and not constant) used in the equation is expressing the even division of 100% (the overall score of the building) on the expected final overall items contained in the assessing method, this figure keep the changing in the item’s weight in an appropriate range, So, for the previous proposed figures the final weight was calculated as follows: Final weight = 2% + {((10/5) ⁎ 3%) + (−(4/6) ⁎ 3%) + (−(3/2) ⁎ 3%) + ((4/1) ⁎ 3%)} = 2% + 6% − 2% − 4.5% + 12% = 13.5%.

d It should be noted that raising or lowering any item’s weight will affect the weights of all other items that are in the same level, to get a total of 100% of the overall weight of the building, and it should be noted that the upper levels are calculated before the lower levels, so changing items weight and their initial weights are limited within the weights of the upper levels.

Table 5 Simplified example of determining the scoring levels of an item according to some variables that could affect it.

Item’s requirement	Level of achievement	Score of achievement	Item’s weight (%)	Final score (%)
All buildings shall be designed to benefit any carbon emissions	100%	1	2	2
All buildings shall be designed to block any carbon emissions	90–100%	0.95		1.9
All buildings shall be designed to minimize carbon emissions and energy demand to achieve a minimum 80% improvement over (“A more strictness regulation than Part L 2006”)	80–90%	0.9		1.8
All buildings shall be designed to minimize carbon emissions and energy demand to achieve a minimum 80% improvement over (Part L 2006)	70–80%	0.85		1.7
All … a minimum 65% improvement over (Part L 2006)	60–70%	0.8		1.6
All … a minimum 50% improvement over (Part L 2006)	50–60%	0.75		1.5
All … a minimum 35% improvement over (Part L 2006)	40–50%	0.7		1.4
All … a minimum 15% improvement over (Part L 2006)	30–40%	0.65		1.3

Table 6 Some comparison aspects between the proposed method and other current methods.

Aspects	Assessment method	Comparisons
Flexibility in modifying the methods components	International versions (BREEAM International – LEED International)	Modification and changes in these methods are restricted with the lowest possible changes, to unify the main form of the method and the main elements all over the world with the original ones, which reduces their flexibility
	GBC (SBTool)	Modification can happen in all its components and elements as long as is necessary to match with the country conditions, but it also allows changing the main presence of the assessed main issues, which leads to a difficulty in comparing the resulting versions between the different countries
	Flexible method	Modification and changes are adjustable without the compliance with a final form; although it maintains the unification of the main assessment issues between all the countries to help comparing their results
Flexibility in modifying the assessing weights	International versions	Include a minimum degree of success in the different assessed issues beside a set of mandatory requirements, but those limits vary between the countries, and there are no minimum limits for them to prevent them being too low in some cases, and there is no relationship between those limits for the same building
	GBC	Does not include limits of success connected to the building
	Flexible method	Includes a minimum degree of success, such as a minimum degree to pass achieving the environmental functions included in the method, so changing the assessment items weights does not lead to overcoming these limits which are all connected with each other for the same building
Flexibility in dealing with different standards	International versions	There is a strict compliance with the stringent degree of the used standards regardless of its preference in dealing with the local characteristics of different countries
	GBC	Allows flexibility to deal with different standards but their stringent degree had no effect on the degree of evaluation
	Flexible method	Allows the flexibility to deal with different standards such as the country-specific standards or the global standards or a combination when needed, taking into account their stringent degree which is itself a variable affecting raising or lowering the weights and score levels of assessment items that use those standards
Flexibility in modifying the rating scores	International versions	Allow changing the predefined rating scores in the original method without the possibility of having other evaluation levels or secondary ones, noticing that the maximum score for evaluating the items may be given to a degree of sustainability less than 100%
	GBC	Allow changing the rating scores of several evaluation levels, noticing that the maximum score for the items are given to a degree of sustainability less than 100%
	Flexible method	Allow flexibility of having several evaluation levels, taking into account that the maximum degree is always given when achieving a 100% sustainable level
Responsible party for forming the method	International versions	They lead for losing a lot of time and effort because of their association with more than one association working on the amendment of the methods
	GBC	Each country can configure their local assessment method on their own without putting a unified level of experts’ experience formatting these methods
	Flexible method	Depends on a specific and competent organization which includes experts from all over the world according to an appropriate level of experience, it may also engage local experts when needed to avoid the effect of a certain view or culture on the produced method