Ing William Evans Halm
ING WILLIAM Evans Halm, Chief Executive
Officer (CEO) of Spektra Global, has called on built environment professionals in
Ghana, to design sustainable buildings over the next 50 years to help
accommodate the growing energy needs of Ghanaians.
Delivering a presentation on “Sustainable buildings
– a shift towards Zero Energy Buildings”at the just-ended International Building Construction and
Property Exhibition at the Accra International Conference Center on Friday, he
defined
sustainable building design as strategies that focussed on maximizing the use
of resources such as energy, water and other materials while reducing the
building’s impact on humans and the environment over the life cycle of the building.
According to Ing Halm, over the next 20
years, sustainable buildings would become a necessity for any city to survive
because sustainable buildings led to lower utility tariffs, used less water
(20-25 per cent compared to conventional buildings), saved about 30 per cent
energy, had low maintenance cost and exhibited better indoor quality of space
leading to healthier, happier and better productivity as well as performance.
To encourage such a drive on the African
continent, he called on governments, development partners and non-governmental
organisations, to play active roles that would help attain such an objective.
“For sustainable buildings to take firm
root in Africa, a deliberate attempt should be made to encourage it by means of
motivations such as incentives (waivers on building permit application fees),
reduction on taxes for companies to build sustainable structures, complete
development of infrastructure to support selling back excess energy produced by
buildings, which would eventually lead to sustainable cities.
Net
zero buildings
He also said it was about time the
Ghanaian built environment witnessed net zero buildings that would emit less
carbons.
Making reference to a research piece by
Lewis A. Asante and Alex Sosu in 2018, titled ‘The Challenge of Reducing the
Incidences of Building Collapse: Analysing the Perspectives Of Building
Inspectors In Kumasi’, Ing Halm highlighted: “In the current climate, the built
environment will continue to pose a threat to human life and property
investment. Although unpleasant to contemplate, the study concludes that Ghana
may witness more building collapses in the near future if the aforesaid
challenges are not addressed.”
Way
forward
The CEO of Spektra Global among other things
recommended collaboration between built environment professional associations,
building regulation authorities, and development control institutions to define
processes and guidelines for ensuring improved construction practices, site
quality control and safety.
Additionally, he called for private sector investment in standard construction laboratories to support construction quality control especially in all major urban centres in Ghana.
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