German Sustainable Building Council (DGNB)—First Worldwide Certification System for Laboratory Buildings
Egbert Dittrich, EGNATON
DGNB e.V., Deutsche Gesellschaft für Nachhaltiges Bauen, or the German Association for Sustainable Building, is the first national association to bring a laboratory-specific certification system to the market. It is based on the German certification system for office buildings. The system realizes that laboratories are entirely different than other buildings in terms of the energy used in the laboratory processes and the tasks fulfilled. It was only possible to allow certification of a huge variety of energy consuming laboratories by establishing a reference building. The reference building represents state-of-the-art design as well as known standards and regulations. More than 50 criteria thoroughly describe sustainable characters of a building and engineering building services. If a standard is improved upon in the future, then the building will need additional points to achieve higher sustainability levels.
The major columns of the certification system are ecological, economic, and sociocultural issues, with an equal evaluation of each. Additionally, the technical quality is considered.
The lecture will show that, with regard to EGNATON, the European partner organization of I2SL, it is necessary to gain sustainability with the focus on the total life cycle. The DGNB system takes care of the building and its architecture and engineering building services. EGNATON is focused on the daily management, building optimization, and questions concerning the running of laboratories, user behavior, and risk assessments but also with problems within the interfaces of architects and engineers. Both systems complete each other, because there is no sustainability without considering the typical characters of the laboratory building, but there is also no sustainability without managing strategies and permanent adjustments.
Biography:
Egbert Dittrich holds mechanical engineering and business studies diplomas. Since 1996, Mr. Dittrich has been the chief executive officer of LABDICON - Dittrich Consulting, and the managing director of European Association of Sustainable Laboratories. Mr. Dittrich has 32 years of experience in laboratory buildings and since 1978 has been the chief executive officer of more than one laboratory equipment manufacturer.