Ombú office building gets a BREEAM In-Use rating of Good
Overview
The Ombú office building was constructed in 2011 and is located in the commune of Providencia, Chile. The building owes its name to an old tree located at the back of the building, called Ombú, to date, this tree continues to be part of the building’s environment. A clear champion for sustainable champions, the project earned a BREEAM In-Use rating of Good.
Background
The goal of the building was to generate value for its users by focusing on sustainability and energy savings. There are also plans for the building to implement recycling systems, reduce energy consumption and increase the percentage of green areas through the installation of hanging plants and low water consumption in addition to reusing rainwater.
Challenges
The greatest environmental challenge for the building was to maintain and increase its standard and commitment to sustainability, promoting energy saving, carbon neutrality and circular economy. All of this would allow for the creation of more pleasant spaces, increasing the quality of the user/visitor experience and adding value to the asset.
Solutions
The high standards that BREEAM demands for the certification of assets drives continuous improvements. As a result, the building has low-consumption elevators, fully LED interior lighting, an air conditioning system with type r-410 refrigerant, and parking for bicycles, among other qualities.
Among the other major initiatives carried out is the use of paint made with resins obtained from recycled EPS (expanded polystyrene) to completely paint the stairwell, subways and the parking demarcations. Another important challenge and commitment was to start the measurement of the carbon footprint, allowing us to start a starting point that provides future guidelines to improve indicators.
Benefits
Thanks to the BREEAM certification, the building has managed to make a reduction in its electricity costs by approximately 20%, due to the change of all lighting to LED. Due to the profile of the companies and users of the building, it is attractive to stay in a sustainable, responsible space and also with an important certification. This same condition adds value when offering the space to the arrival of potential new tenants.
The BREEAM certification also helped to generate ambitious and important challenges in sustainability, environmental responsibility and in the integration of the building community. This helped to generate loyalty and commitment in the tenant-management-owner relationship, allowing the client to have the peace of mind about the building. Benefits to the client include savings in energy consumption, safer spaces and environmental responsibility.