Appraising a decade of LEED in the MENA region
Introduction
The MENA region countries share common development goals and challenges of similar social, political, economic and environmental backgrounds. The region faces many defies in order to adhere to the international environmental treaties; emission reduction on one hand as well as reducing energy consumption and transitioning to clean renewable energy production on the other hand. The problem escalates in the context of severe climate changes and rapid economic and population growth which shall no doubt influence the international energy systems (Griffiths, 2017). In this occasion, the building sector is playing a central role in energy consumption and emissions release. It is noted that buildings account for 24% of the total energy use in the region (Elgendy, 2011) and that this number can be reduced by 50% using proper energy efficiency measures (Krarti and Ihm, 2016). This has called many countries to introduce environmental assessment and control mechanisms such as the GBRSs to provide guidelines and measuring tools for sustainable design and construction practices along buildings’ life cycle (Shareef and Altan, 2017). Accordingly, there are a number of push-factors towards the diffusion of the LEED system as an internationally recognized third-party certification and create an added value for the certified buildings in terms of their differentiation and branding in the international marketplace. Moreover, they would improve energy regulations, provide standardization of green building performance and practices and attract opportunities for investments in local green markets (Gobbi et al., 2016, Ismaeel, 2016).
The study adopts a cross-comparative approach to investigate the push-factors for the LEED system's diffusion in the MENA area on the regional and country levels and explain the reason for the variations in point-scoring among sustainable categories as shown in Figure (1). This has indicated two sets of parameters; these associated with the application of the LEED system itself and other associated with individual countries' status. The former takes into account the number of LEED projects, accredited professionals and member organisations. It also accounts for countries' adoption rates of LEED categories and their temporal diffusion pattern. This is in addition to the prevailing certification level, rating type and version adopted. The latter includes countries' economic status (GDP and GNI), social and environmental ranking (climate classification, EPI index and Legatum prosperity index) as well as energy and emissions status. This is in addition to the judicial and legislative status expressed in the existence of national energy codes and standards and the active initiatives for GBCs' and national GBRSs.
This recognized certification scheme enable comparing buildings' performance on a common basis of assessment and provide insights for the application of the LEED system in the MENA region and its adaptation to the national contexts of different Arab countries in addition to investigating the green market behaviour in the region. This pinpoints the current challenges for the green building industry in the region and sets a common basis comparing the system's performance in principal LEED adopting countries. The results present a decade appraisal of the LEED system against the national and regional sustainability initiatives in the MENA region-Arab countries. It also indicates the status of the green market in the region with regards to the types of buildings, sectors, certification types and levels. Furthermore, the adoption rates of categories pinpoint existing precedencies and challenges of applying the green building design and construction measures. This is a novel contribution that presents an essential reading for LEED projects to be able to trace the green building industry and compare it to international status. Knowing that it can be stated that the green industry in the Arab countries is facing a major thriving transformation based on a legislative base for energy efficiency to guarantee better adherence to GBRSs and achieve higher adoption rates in different sustainable categories.
Section snippets
Literature review
A comprehensive literature review using the Science Direct database has mapped the extent and value-contribution of relevant studies and identified existing gaps and limitations. The online search has been conducted for the period of 2000–2018 using the following keywords; LEED, credits' correlations, credits’ adoption rates, MENA region, energy and emission status and green building rating systems. The selection of keywords ensured including all related topics using the Boolean operations
The research methodology
The research has adopted a quantitative cross-comparative methodology to investigate both the countries’ associated parameters and LEED associated parameters-divided into the following steps shown in Figure (2);
Results
The study enables understanding of the performance of the LEED system on the regional and country levels. The former level investigates the regional status of adopting the LEED system which provides a general overview concerning the applicability of the system in hot climatic countries.
Discussion
The results of this study pinpoint the importance of adopting a holistic approach to promote sustainable building industry in the MENA region countries. This should be supported by establishing regional logistics, national public policy and motivating the private sector. In this regards, two sets of interrelated parameters have been recognized. The former includes countries' associated parameters; the strategic national policies pave the way through establishing a robust legislative framework
Conclusion and recommendations for future studies
This study presents the LEED system as a common base for synopsis with a view to explain the cause and effect of its diffusion in the MENA region-Arab countries and compare points' allocation patterns for different sustainable categories. The research findings advance understanding of the challenges facing the green building industry and third-party certification system. The analysis has highlighted two interrelated sets of parameters; LEED diffusion associated parameters and countries’
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