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A Pragmatic Proposal for Award of Credits to Qualify as a Green Building in Developing Country
Authors: Pragyan Bhattarai, A.V.A Bharat Kumar, Rajendra Chaudhary, Dr. Shashi Kumar Gupta

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Over the years there has been significant increase in the standard of living of the people around the globe due to rapid industrialization, and urbanization. However, these developments have also resulted in exploitation and overuse of natural resources, which are now hitting us back in the form of global warming, natural calamities and other tantamount effects. The word is slowly getting spread that we need to protect the environment so the quality of life for us and future generations does not deteriorate. To protect our Environment, the concept of Green Building has come in to picture which helps to reduce the pollution that is being produced from industries, automobiles, houses, pesticides, etc. However, lack of awareness on this technology, coupled with improper city planning, and complacency to provide support at the level of Government and local bodies has challenged for astute implementation of green technology. A Green Building is a sustainable building which is environmentally eco-friendly and resource efficient. Developed countries like USA, UK kick started to make people aware about this technology and provide aid for implementation through organizations like USGBC (United State Green Building Council), LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environment Design) and NAHB (National Authority of High Rise Buildings). In India, too, the task has been taken up through IGBC(Indian Green Building Council). The main aim of the Council is to reduce the pollution that emanates from houses and industries and seek for alternative renewable resources of energy for efficient use of building materials. In this research the process of point system for award of IGBC credits has been studied in detail and it was observed that the system is too complex for adoption for low and middle income group of houses in developing country environments like India and Nepal. Thus there is a need to review and suggest an encouraging system of categorizing the houses as Green Houses in developing country environment. In this research different factors like area, type of design, materials used have been included to come up with new plans and assignments of credits in a way that they can be achieved relatively easily. Also components like landscape, parking facilities, energy performance, grey water management, management of irrigation systems, credits have also been factored in so that certification as green building is made easy for new and existing low and middle income groups/class of houses to promote sustainable development in the near future