Developing a Green Building Rating System for Pakistan: An Integrated Multi-Criteria Decision-Making Approach

Abstract

The construction industry has a significant impact on the economy, society, and the environment. Meanwhile, it also presents impediments such as high energy consumption, depletion of resources, and environmental pollution. To address these issues, the concept of green building arose, with the objective of designing, constructing, and operating buildings that minimize environmental impacts and promote sustainability. This thesis concentrates on devising a Green Building Rating System for Pakistan, a developing country with distinct socioeconomic and environmental circumstances. Among the objectives of the project are the identification of parameters pertinent to green building in developing nations and the creation of an evaluation model for rating the greenness of residential buildings. The research methodology utilized a multi-criteria’s decision-making strategy that incorporated Fuzzy Analytical Hierarchy Process (FAHP), fuzzy measures and fuzzy integral, and the Weighted Sum Method (WSM). In order to acquire data from Pakistani experts, questionnaires were used to ensure the incorporation of valuable insights and perspectives. The FAHP methodology allowed for the determination of relative weights for the identified green criteria, taking subjective and objective criteria’s into account. Using fuzzy measures and fuzzy integral, the relative significance and importance of sub-criteria’s that are interdependent in evaluating green buildings were determined. Using the weighted ratings of various factors, the WSM method calculated the Green Building Index (GBI) to determine a building's overall greenness. This approach considered essential factors such as energy efficiency, water conservation, material utilization, interior air quality, and others. A Java-based application was constructed to facilitate the implementation and evaluation of the developed system. The application offered a user-friendly and intuitive interface for inputting data on sub-criteria’s and calculating the GBI value. JavaScript was added to increase interactivity and responsiveness, making it accessible to a variety of construction industry constituents. This study is significant for its contribution to the framework of green building systems in Pakistan and its expansion of knowledge regarding sustainable construction practices. The objective of the project is to promote sustainable and environmentally favorable construction practices in Pakistan by creating a context-specific rating system.