The meeting was held in the impressive offices of the European Investment Bank opened in 2008, the first building in continental Europe to have the BREEAM applied to its design and construction. It received an "excellent" rating, the highest available at that time. Jean-Louis Hubermont was much involved in this exercise.

The importance of providing a credible and recognised system of environmental rating in buildings was stressed. This was driven by the mounting concern on human impacts in the built environment shared by developers, users and the public in general. A logical process of independent certification such as BREEAM helps to quantify and encourage sustainability. Comparisons between buildings are possible and standards above the legal minimum are encouraged, often giving rise to innovative solutions. The process is structured but dynamic in that it adapts to new developments. The BRE provide the independence necessary for credibility – too much self-regulation in the past has often been ineffective.

Jean-Louis is based in Belgium and presented a comparison of the various systems available there and their current status. The most used is clearly BREEAM and the experience from more than 20 years' operating seems to have influenced the more recent alternative methods such as the French HQE, the Belgian VALIDEO and the German DGNB. Other approaches such as the USA's LEED and Australian GREENSTAR are not much used in Belgium. BREEAM seems also to have made its mark in the Netherlands, Norway, Spain and Sweden and is used in France, Germany and Luxembourg. It is also being introduced in Turkey and elsewhere and so becoming internationally accepted.

The key characteristic is that it is structured with some 9 subject areas which are tailored to the local context by the independent BRE approved assessors. The items assessed and their weightings may also changes with time and developments. The minimum rating is based on the legal requirement and the full rating is given by the best possible practice. This tailored approach was illustrated by showing a rather extreme example of a building in Europe against that of a building in the Gulf States. In the latter case "water" was the most important chapter (30%) against 6% in Europe, while in Europe "energy" was dominant with 19% against 13% in the Gulf.

The method is applied through the various stages of a project, with a pre-assessment, an interim Design stage followed by a post construction Final stage. "BREEAM in use" then takes over for the operational and use stages. The idea is to continuously guide the processes making sure that the environmental impacts are considered properly in the decisions, notably upstream in the conception and design. When the overall rating has been finalised it is classified into blocks with >70% being considered "excellent" and > 85% "outstanding". BREEAM can be applied to new buildings, part buildings such as extensions, or refurbished buildings as well as to all uses but generally not to housing. The most common so far in the BREEAM Europe suite have been commercial buildings such as offices, industrial and retail buildings but public buildings or any building may be processed using bespoke methods.

A summary search in Belgium has found some 10 BREEAM certified buildings and more than 50 registered, many more than the alternative methods (e.g. HQE and VALIDEO). However this is modest compared with the 100 000 buildings certified by BREEAM worldwide but a useful if tentative start.

BRE have tried to evaluate the construction cost of increased rating of buildings and clearly a wide range results as it is very context specific. However as an indication taking "Pass" as the base cost, "Good" does not cost much more but "Very good" may entail extra costs of from 0.1% to 5.7% with "Excellent" ranging from 2.5% to 7.0%. On the benefits side for the example of offices the BREEAM process could provide +3.5% higher rentals, +3% better occupancy rates and +2.5% higher capital value all associated with a reduction of 8-9% in operational costs. These figures come from an independent study by RICS & University of Maastricht and showed significant benefits as one would expect. Other work confirms this conclusion.

An interesting discussion followed. The reality of the process really nfluencing design was questioned, but it was clear that the method must be approached in the right positive spirit and not merely as a necessary evil to be manipulated. The fact that the method remains dynamic and adaptable as well as independent is important for its future.

We were most grateful to Jean-Louis Hubermont for sharing his experience with us and presenting such an interesting and instructive lecture. BREEAM and its equivalence will certain become more common in future also on "Continental Europe" and this was an excellent introduction

Peter Bond, ICE representative for Luxembourg