Potential contribution of environmental building certifications to urban sustainability - Curitiba case study

Abstract Environmental building certifications can be used as an effective environmental management tool to reduce resource consumption, such as water and energy in a building. When applied to a large number of buildings in a city, these savings can significantly reduce municipal demand for water and electricity, thus contributing to a region achieving Sustainable Development Goals in an integrated manner. The present work aims to estimate the benefits of environmental certifications of commercial buildings for urban sustainability in a case study in a city. Various scenarios with different levels of future environmental certification adoption are generated, and their contribution to water and energy savings for the city of Curitiba are analyzed. In the best-case scenario, energy savings of 9.9 million MWh were observed for the city, which means not spending up to R$ 600 million in new energy sources, and emissions reductions of 1,600,000 tCO2e between 2018 and 2040. These energy savings correspond to nearly twice the total consumption of the city of Curitiba in 2018. Furthermore, in the best-case scenario, the water savings are estimated to be enough to supply water during 1.5 months in 2020.