A Comprehensive Cost Benefit Analysis of Green Buildings

Abstract

As the Earth’s population continues to escalate and the aspiring countries pursue their resource utilization indiscriminately, it is necessary to ascertain, how we, as a planet, use our scarce resources judiciously. India accounts for nearly about 5.5% of the World’s energy to feed 17.74% of the Earth’s population. About 33% of this energy is consumed by the building segment, thus exposing the unsustainable nature of the sector. This study presents the financial aspects of a Green Building over a Conventional Building considering New Delhi’s climatology based on criteria published by Green Rating for Integrated Habitat Assessment (GRIHA). The cost calculation is estimated on a projected Green Building (10.0 m × 7.0 m) modeled in AutoCAD and evaluated on Microsoft Excel Sheet and CostMiner software. Findings show that an increase in the initial investment of about 9.702% to support green design typically makes the initial investment equivalent after a payback period of 16 years while computing it on Net Present Value with an inflation rate of 3.8% and interest rate of 10.5%.