Green Buildings
Green Buildings
Green Buildings is a specialized vertical founded by Vaibhav Jain, stands at the forefront of the industrial real estate evolution. Led by a distinguished team of industry experts, the Group is dedicated to setting new benchmarks through the development of customized, future-ready, and environmentally responsible IT/ITES & Industrial spaces. The sections below set out the practices, process and standards the team actually works to.
What we mean by "green"
A green building demonstrably uses less energy, less water and fewer virgin materials than the same building built to minimum code — and is documented well enough that someone can verify it. It is not a landscaping budget, renders with trees in them, or a solar panel on an otherwise ordinary roof.
Most of the performance is locked in before a single drawing is issued for construction.
Seven Practice Areas
The levers that actually move a building's performance. We work through all seven on a green mandate; on a conventional project we still apply the first three, because they cost little and pay back regardless.
Passive design & orientation
Sun path and prevailing wind studied before massing is fixed. Longer facades turned toward north and south, glazing on the west controlled hard. Window-to-wall ratio set against a daylight target rather than a sales render. External shading sized off the actual solar geometry for Delhi-NCR's latitude, not copied from a catalogue.
Why it matters: the cheapest kilowatt-hour is the one the building never needed. Orientation and shading cost effectively nothing at concept stage and are impossible to retrofit.
Envelope & thermal performance
Wall and roof assemblies specified to a target U-value rather than a habit. Glazing selected on solar heat gain coefficient and visible light transmittance together, so daylight is not traded away to control heat. High-reflectance roof treatments on large-footprint industrial sheds, where roof gain dominates cooling load.
Benchmarks: envelope parameters checked against ECBC 2017 for commercial and industrial, and Eco-Niwas Samhita for residential.
Energy systems & metering
HVAC sized off a real load calculation rather than a rule of thumb, which is where most oversizing and wasted running cost comes from. LED and BLDC throughout, with daylight- and occupancy-linked controls. Rooftop solar assessed on every project against roof area, shading and the state's net-metering position.
Non-negotiable: sub-metering by end use. A building nobody measures is a building nobody can improve.
Water: demand, reuse, recharge
Demand cut first through low-flow fixtures, because reuse infrastructure sized against inflated demand is wasted capital. On-site treatment with dual plumbing carrying flushing, irrigation and cooling-tower make-up. Rainwater harvesting with recharge pits sized to the site's soil percolation.
Context: most of Delhi-NCR sits in over-exploited groundwater blocks. Recharge here is a licence-to-operate issue, not a credit to be scored.
Low-carbon materials
Cement replacement with fly ash or GGBS at levels the structural consultant signs off on. Local sourcing within the radius rating systems recognise. Recycled-content steel, AAC blocks in place of fired clay brick where the structure allows, and low-VOC paints and adhesives so air quality at handover is not compromised by the finishing trades.
Honest limit: embodied carbon accounting in Indian supply chains is still patchy. We specify what is verifiable and do not claim precision we cannot evidence.
Construction-stage practice
This is where most green projects quietly fail. Waste segregated at source with excavated soil reused on site. Dust suppression, wheel-wash and covered stockpiles — enforced under GRAP restrictions through Delhi-NCR's winter air-quality season. Worker welfare treated as part of the environmental scope, because it is.
Our position: a certified building delivered off a badly-run site is a failed project. We would rather lose the credit than pretend.
Commissioning & handover
Systems tested against design intent before handover, not just switched on and signed off. Balancing reports, meter schedules and as-builts compiled into an O&M package the facility team can actually use, plus training for whoever runs the building.
Why it matters: the performance gap between design and operation is usually a commissioning failure, not a design failure.
What we don't claim
We do not describe a building as certified until the rating body has issued the certificate. We do not publish energy or water savings without stating the baseline they are measured against. We do not call a project net zero on the strength of an offset purchase.
If a project met some of these practices and not others, we would rather say which.
Our Process
Six stages. The order is the point — each closes off decisions that get expensive to revisit later.
Site & feasibility
Solar geometry, wind, tree cover, soil percolation, groundwater status, grid position and the local statutory position. Output is a written view on what performance this specific site can support — and what it will cost. Sites that cannot carry a rating are told so before fees are committed.
Target setting
Client and team agree the rating system and level, the energy and water targets, and the budget attached. Written down and signed off, so green does not quietly erode as costs get squeezed.
Integrated design
Architect, structural, MEP and green consultant in the same room from concept — not MEP receiving a frozen set and being asked to make it efficient. Envelope, daylight and load modelling run while massing can still change.
Documentation & submission
Simulation reports, material declarations, cut-sheets and drawings assembled for the rating body's design-stage review. Unglamorous, and the stage where most certification attempts stall.
Construction & verification
Site practices enforced through the contract, with material records kept as they arrive rather than reconstructed at the end. Periodic checks that what is built matches what was modelled.
Commissioning & operations
Testing against design intent, O&M handover, operator training, and — where the client wants it — a post-occupancy review once the building has run a full summer.
What We Build Against
Rating systems are not interchangeable. Which suits a project depends on building type, who the occupier or lender is, and whether the value is in the certificate or the running cost.
IGBC
Indian Green Building Council, part of CIIThe most widely recognised Indian system, with separate tracks for green homes, new commercial buildings and factory buildings. Well understood by Indian developers, contractors and local authorities, which makes it the path of least friction on most of our work.
GRIHA
TERI, endorsed by the Government of IndiaIndia's national rating system, rated out of five stars. Weighted more toward site ecology, water and construction-stage management, and frequently the requirement on government or institutional projects.
LEED
U.S. Green Building CouncilThe international benchmark. Worth the extra documentation when the occupier is a multinational with a global portfolio standard, or an international lender is involved.
EDGE
IFC, World Bank GroupResource-efficiency focused, requiring a demonstrated reduction against a local baseline in energy, water and embodied energy. Lighter to document and often the pragmatic choice for residential at scale.
ECBC 2017
Bureau of Energy Efficiency — mandatorySets minimum envelope, lighting and HVAC performance for larger commercial buildings, with ECBC, ECBC+ and SuperECBC tiers. A floor to clear, not an achievement to advertise.
Eco-Niwas Samhita
Bureau of Energy Efficiency — residential codeThe residential counterpart to ECBC, setting envelope performance through a residential envelope transmittance value. Alongside it sit local rainwater, treatment and solar obligations.
Current Focus
IT / ITES facilities
High occupant density and long operating hours make HVAC efficiency, daylight and indoor air quality the dominant variables. Occupiers increasingly arrive with their own portfolio sustainability standard, so certification is often a leasing prerequisite.
Industrial & warehousing
Large roof areas make solar PV and roof thermal performance decisive, and the same footprint makes rainwater harvesting genuinely worthwhile. Built-to-suit lets us fix orientation and envelope around the occupier's actual process.
Residential
Passive design, envelope and water reuse carry across directly to our housing work in East Delhi and Noida — where the payoff shows up as a lower electricity bill and a cooler home in May, rather than a plaque in the lobby.