38 P. JIANG ET AL.
3.1 IntroductIon
Approximately 15 million people will be added to the urban population
in China every year between 2000 and 2030 (de Oliveira et al. 2012 ),
which means that there will be greater demand for urban dwellings. While
economic development and social changes in China have accelerated
as a result of urbanization, rapid urban development has also increased
resource and energy demand and has accelerated environmental degrada-
tion at unprecedented levels. More critically, as large quantities of fossil
fuels are consumed due to the process of urbanization in China, billions
of tons of greenhouse gases (GHGs) and pollutants are emitted into the
atmosphere every year, contributing to serious problems—climate change
and air pollution. GHG and pollution emissions will increase with patterns
of urban expansion and with ongoing improvements in living standards.
Approximately 2 billion square meters of new buildings (over 90 % of these
are urban) appear each year, and approximately 21 billion square meters of
new buildings are expected to be constructed by 2020 in China to match
urban growth (World Bank 2001 ), which is equivalent to the current building
area of the EU-15 (Ecofys 2006 ). With improved living conditions, an ongo-
ing increase in Chinese buildings’ energy consumption levels will occur until
2050 (Qiu et al. 2007 ). Energy usage in the building sector accounts for 28 %
of all energy consumption in China (Jiang and Keith 2013 ). In total, 95 %
of the 43 billion square meters of buildings in China consists of high energy
consumption buildings, and 80 % of all new buildings do not adopt (or only
adopt a few) energy-saving measures (Jiang et al. 2013 ). One core objective
of China’s “Twelfth Five-Year Plan” is to ensure long-term sustainable urban
development. Promoting green building development is the main goal of this
plan. According to the “The National New Urban Planning 2014–2020”
document, the proportion of green buildings in the set of all new buildings
will increase from 2 % in 2012 to 50 % in 2020 (MOHURD 2014 ).
Green buildings are also addressed in other countries’ sustainable develop-
ment strategies. Several famous green building codes have been issued and
implemented, such as the Leadership in Energy Environment Design (LEED)
scheme in the USA, the Building Research Establishment Environmental
Assessment Method (BREEAM) in the UK, and the Comprehensive
Assessment System for Building Environmental Efficiency (CASBEE) in Japan.
These green building coding systems have significantly enhanced green build-
ing development not only in these three countries but also in other countries.
Table 3.1 provides a general overview of the LEED, BREEAM, and CASBEE
systems (Wang and Jiang 2006 ; Tian 2009 ; Huiling and Burnett 2008 ).