Green building in existing development: a review of current status, challenges, and implementation strategy

Abstract

Green building development is on the rise with more new constructions receiving green building certification locally and globally. Starting with 247 papers in the first cycle searching of greening an existing building, this paper conducts a literature review over 30 relevant publications related to the effort towards greening the existing development from various countries especially in Malaysia, since three specific case studies on implementation of greening existing building were analyzed from this country. Regarding to the review on current development status, there occur several challenges of existing building standards from the regulatory that will slow the target achievement towards a sustainable plan besides the cost implication and project feasibility that resulting in most existing buildings do not embed green building elements. Therefore, retrofitting the existing structure might contribute to a positive, sustainable impact, including cost-saving, living comfortability, and environmental preservation. However, the decision-making on retrofitting action needs detailed analysis. This is especially in identifying expenditure on current building performance, potential cost benefits through lifecycle assessment and cost-benefit analysis. This paper presents three case studies of green retrofitting project in Malaysia and highlights twenty effective strategies towards successful retrofitting for sustainable development. According to the summative analysis of the strategies, the most important element to be addressed in retrofitting action towards a green building is thoroughly assessing the current performance and needs of the development to meet the sustainability impact. It is recommended for future researchers to conduct a survey on the details of the procedure from specific stakeholders with focus on regional-based existing building conditions.