Certified sustainability for heritage buildings: development of the new rating system GBC Historic Building

Abstract

Recognition of testimonial value must be an integrated part of a sustainable building pro-cess aimed at the preservation and enhancement of all the previous expressions of the building. Green Building Council Italia is moving within this cultural context with the main goal, developed through an interdisciplinary working group, of the establishment of a vol-untary certification protocol aimed at evaluating the sustainability level of restoration, re-furbishment and integration in pre-industrial buildings. This innovative tool is based on the comparison and union of two different cultures: the sustainability criteria of the LEED® protocol and the wealth of knowledge of the restoration world with the ultimate goal of identification, enhancement and transmission of the cultural heritage to the future genera-tions. The paper presents the very first deliverables of the new rating system GBC Historic Building™ starting from the identification of the protocol’s field of application, defined through the “Historic Building Identity Card”, a general information form to be used at the very beginning of the certification process and based on the building’s technological struc-ture. Since existing LEED® topics do not include specific issues concerning the renovation process of the historic heritage, a new topic called “Historic Value” has been introduced with the purpose of improving sustainability level enhancing the building without com-promising its cultural value. The paper also shows innovations added throughout the new protocol and the contribution of the first registered case study.