The FINANCIAL — IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, has partnered with Green Building Council Indonesia (GBC Indonesia) to launch the EDGE certification program to encourage resource-efficient building growth.
EDGE (“Excellence in Design for Greater Efficiencies”) is a green building certification system that proves the business case for building green in emerging markets. EDGE offers free software that allows designers to choose technical solutions while showing the extra costs to build green and the payback period. Better design reduces energy and water use, which in turn lowers the monthly utility bills for owners and tenants.
“With the rapid development of construction in Indonesia, greater ecological and financial losses will occur unless we achieve sustainable urban development,” said Andreas Suhono, Director General of Human Settlements, Ministry of Public Works and Public Housing. “We encourage investors, developers, and practitioners to build more responsibly by choosing voluntary certification standards such as EDGE.”
In Indonesia, buildings account for about 30 percent of the country’s energy consumption, a number that is set to rise to close to 40 percent by 2030. Up to one-third of energy and water consumption can be easily reduced through better building design and operation.
“EDGE is a quick, simple, and affordable way to convince developers to design better buildings,” said Naning Adiwoso, Chairperson of GBC Indonesia. “We see EDGE as a complement to GBC Indonesia’s existing GREENSHIP certification that will help to scale up resource-efficient residential and commercial buildings.”
Over the next seven years, GBC Indonesia will develop a market for EDGE and act as a third party certifier. IFC and GBC Indonesia aim to award EDGE certification to 20 percent of new construction projects, equivalent to 80,000 housing units. This level of penetration will help cut 1.2 million metric tons of greenhouse-gas emissions per year, avoid 500 megawatt-hours of energy use, and save almost $200 million per year by 2021, according to IFC.
“By introducing EDGE, IFC has brought a solution to the marketplace that spells out the cost advantages of building green,” said Prashant Kapoor, IFC’s Principal Green Building Specialist. “Now is the time to encourage large-scale adoption of green building design in Indonesia.”
The launch was announced a day before the New Cities Summit, a global gathering on the future of cities, for which the IFC is a partner.
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