The developer is now the largest single owner of LEED Platinum grade office buildings in Central
HONG KONG SAR 7 May 2024 – Hongkong Land proudly announces that its Central portfolio buildings in Hong Kong have all achieved LEED for Existing Buildings: Operations & Maintenance (LEED EBOM) Platinum ranking as recognised by the U.S. Green Building Council. LEED EBOM measures actual data from building performance instead of design or simulated data. The result is a testament to Hongkong Land’s longstanding commitment to excellence across property management and upgrading existing buildings in meeting the highest green building standards. This demonstrates that retrofitted buildings can often surpass the requirements of new buildings in terms of energy efficiency standards. In some cases, these upgrades can even achieve higher efficiency standards than newly constructed buildings.
Retrofitting existing buildings has resulted in the average energy utilisation index of Hongkong Land’s offices being within the top 15 percentile of Grade-A offices in Hong Kong and within the top 10 percentile amongst buildings with office and retail components. This clearly demonstrates that retrofitted buildings can achieve the same energy efficiency standards as new buildings without the carbon-intensive process of new construction.
Kenneth Foo, Executive Director at Hongkong Land said, “This recognition clearly demonstrates that you don’t have to be new to be more sustainable. In fact, Jardine House which is home to some of Hong Kong’s most impressive global and local organisations, was completed in 1973 and is the highest performing building in our Central Portfolio across water efficiency, energy efficiency, air quality, and waste diversion.”
These certifications are a result of the ambitious sustainability targets Hongkong Land set in its Sustainability Framework 2030. The Group has set science-based targets approved by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), aiming for an absolute reduction of 46.2% in emissions by 2030 from 2019 levels. Additionally, Hongkong Land is reducing Scope 1 and 2 carbon emissions by 29% against a 2019 baseline. Hongkong Land will release its 2023 sustainability progress report in May, further detailing its progress and setting new targets.
Hongkong Land’s strategy to achieve these targets has been to focus on improving energy efficiency in existing buildings, while also working to monitor and reduce the embodied carbon required for new builds with its bespoke embodied carbon measurement tool. The tool uses a supplier-based approach tailored to supply chains across the region, which allows the identification of carbon saving opportunities across the design, tendering and construction processes. Embodied carbon refers to the carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions associated with materials and construction processes throughout the entire lifecycle of a building, and can account for up to 50% of the total carbon footprint of a building.
