پیش بینی سود و زیان ساختمان های سبز: آنالیز تکافت روش های تحقیق Cost-benefit prediction of green buildings: SWOT analysis of research methods and recent applications

1. Introduction 1.1. Background knowledge In recent decades, there has been a growing concern regarding environmental issues, and consumption of energy and resources in the building sector. Green buildings or sustainable developments are a response to growing environmental concerns. Yudelson [1] defines green building as “A high-performance property that considers and reduces its impact on the environment and human health”. Yet, green architecture developments seem to encounter several impediments and barriers. Gou et al. [2] mentioned some of the major topics in green building market readiness and some cost-related barriers such as higher initial design and construction costs, extra costs of searching for green alternatives and certification processes, a long payback time of 20 years and a difficulty of defining quantifiable requirements during the procurement process. The extra costs and related risks of green design technology may discourage initial investors from commitment to green attributes [2]. Hwang and Tan [3] indicated that the ambiguity of the real costs and benefits is a major impediment to the development of green buildings. Cost-benefit analysis is a quantitative economic analysis method which evaluates profitability and return of investments for alternative design options [4]. Similarly to traditional financial strategy and performance measurements, green cost-benefit studies examine the correlations between green strategies and green performances to discover relationships between costs and benefits for decision making. In green building studies, the relationships between green strategies and building performances are examined to verify the existence and strength of the link among certain variables, such as natural ventilation strategies and thermal comfort performances. Cost-benefit studies, though, aim to identify relationships among green costs as a consequence of green strategies and benefits as a consequence of green performances. In other words, the extra costs of green buildings are evaluated against the extra financial benefits. Figure 1 illustrates both the relationships between strategies and performances found in green research studies, and the relationships between costs and benefits resulted from cost-benefit research studies.