The Environment Ministry has launched an environmentally-friendly building certification system, the ministry’s chief, Gusti Muhammad Hatta, said here on Friday.
“The environmentally-friendly building certification system is one of our efforts to reduce green house gas emission which is predicted to reach 26 percent in 2020,” Gusti said.
He said increasing efficiency was the cheapest way to overcome greenhouse gas emissions.
According to him, urban areas were considered to be very strategic in implementing environmental protection and management because the urban sectors used significant water resources, energy, materials, and land.
The minister said one of the instruments of his ministry’s policies was environmentally-friendly buildings that applied “sustainable consumption and production” in the implementation of climate change adaptation and mitigation.
The implementation of the environmentally-friendly building certification system was expected to have economic and social impacts, especially in the stimulation of demand and supply with a vast quantity and quality.
Therefore, he said, he had issued Ministerial Regulation No.8/2010 on the criteria and certification of environmentally-friendly buildings.
In the regulation, the criteria for environmentally-friendly buildings was that they should use local environmentally-friendly building materials with ecolabel certificates, and use conservation-related water resources.
Additionally, such buildings should use raw materials that do not damage the ozone, and renewable alternative energy sources with low greenhouse gas emissions.
Meanwhile, Green Building Council of Indonesia (GBCI) Chairman Naning Adiwoso said the certification of environmentally-friendly buildings had long term advantages with low cost.
He pointed out that a number of buildings which were already in the process of certification, including the Public Works Ministry building, were able to save energy by up to 38 percent.
