Influence of BREEAM on commercial building users of small and medium enterprises in refurbished buildings

Turner, N

Abstract

BREEAM has been in existence since the early 1990s, currently there are over 550,000
BREEAM certified buildings with over 2 million registered globally (NBS, 2016).
According to Rhodes, C, Ward, M (2020) there are 5.9million Small and Medium Enterprises
(SMEs) in the UK with many of them looking more to BREEAM for a myriad of reasons
including Planning requirements and obtaining funding. This could result in the number of
BREEAM rated commercial buildings growing exponentially over the coming years.
The Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) suggest that the lifecycle of property is in
four distinct stages from planning/procurement to construction to occupation and finally to
demolition. The National Building Specification (NBS) estimate the design life of
commercial buildings to be around 50 years (NBS 2015). Much of this period relates to
occupation, therefore, mistakes and omissions in the design can have a profound affect for the
life of the building. Currently, research is limited on how building users feel, behave and
interact with environmentally rated buildings.
The following thesis analyses the responses from building users who have firstly experienced
working in a none-BREEAM rated commercial building, as a benchmark, and now work in a
BREEAM rated building. The focus of the thesis is primarily Small and Medium Enterprises
(SMEs) where the take up from BREEAM is gathering traction. Using a case study
methodology qualitative data were obtained by conducting in-depth interviews and analysing
the supplied documentation across a pilot study and a case study. This included questions
relating to; awareness of BREEAM, the services in the building, thoughts around travel and
recycling. Interviewees were also asked about their sustainable behaviour at home as a
comparison. Responses were analysed using Nvivo. Initial findings indicate that when
BREEAM credits are incorrectly selected and applied to the building they have a negative
impact on building users. Coupled with this is the level of automation required within
BREEAM to achieve the higher ratings, as this was causing levels of discomfort and
attracting complaints. It was also recognised that the assessment is seldom integrated into the
working lives of the building users when many of them having little awareness of BREEAM.
The complaints identified in this study were such that a separate complaints map was
produced to capture that data. This culminated in the production of a framework to assist with
integrating BREEAM into the daily lives of building users by providing policy interventions
at key stages. The study also alludes to a four-pillar decision making process to aide SME’s
with environmental sign-posts when acquiring new and managing existing space. The four
pillars are namely tangibility, feedback, useable benefits and training. Following refinement
and coding of the raw data loose grouping was applied. Emerging themes of each group
suggested that; further training on BREEAM features is a need, feedback on the building and
wider features of BREEAM is a need, where outcomes are tangible building users are more
likely to engage, and finally where building users gain a benefit, regardless of BREEAM but
helpful towards implementation, building users are likely to engage.
This research provides a foundation for further research in the area of occupation satisfaction
in BREEAM rated buildings.

Citation

Turner, N. Influence of BREEAM on commercial building users of small and medium enterprises in refurbished buildings. (Dissertation). University of Salford

• Thesis Type: Dissertation
• Deposit Date: Nov 9, 2021
• Publicly Available Date: Nov 9, 2021
• Award Date: Aug 8, 2021