The GBCA has announced that it has launched Apartments Pathway – an Early Access Program for Green Star Buildings.
Participants in the Early Access Program are working closely with the GBCA to help inform the direction of the pathway and to help shape other elements of its approach.
In 2021, GBCA launched Green Star Homes, a rating tool to facilitate the delivery of healthy, resilient and positive homes, targeting the volume home market. This rating tool, whilst still in its early days, has been adopted by a range of volume builders and land developers in greenfield and infill settings. The Council’s strategy is to keep supporting the industry in the uptake of the tool for greenfield and infill developments with class one homes.
GBCA’s pathway for apartments supports its work in single dwelling homes, recognising the vast number of apartment dwellings built every year and the opportunity to provide the occupants with similar benefits to a Green Star Homes. This approach will involve using the Green Star Buildings rating tool with an Apartments Pathway tailored for buildings that contain apartments.
Green Star already has a strong track record of certifying apartment buildings, with more than 100 certified to date and many more registered for certification under the Green Star Buildings tool. The Apartments Pathway builds on this momentum, and it seeks to further assure the outcomes for the occupants of an apartment, within a building certified under Green Star Buildings.
All units in the building will need to meet the requirements of The Apartments Pathway to achieve its Green Star Buildings certification. It leverages existing credits within Green Star Buildings, in conjunction with the tool’s minimum expectations and some new sector specific credits developed specifically for this pathway.
The pathway will be for fully dedicated apartment buildings and mixed-use developments, applicable across all class two multi-unit building typologies including Build to Rent, build to sell and social housing (such as public/community and affordable housing apartments).
The Apartments Pathway Early Access Program partners include Cbus Property, Frasers Property, Homes Victoria, Lendlease, Sentinel and Stockland.
Testing of the draft credits has started with the launch of our Early Access Program and will continue over the next six months. A technical release of the credits to industry is planned for mid-to late 2024.
Projects will have an opportunity to register voluntarily for the Apartments pathway during a transition period after which time it will become mandatory for all apartment projects registering for certification under the Green Star Buildings rating tool (timing to be confirmed).
