Abstract:
Green roof is a building envelop embedded concept to compensate the consequences of
green losses due to building constructions with its numerous benefits in all
environmental, economic and social aspects. But the application of green roofs in Sri
Lankan buildings is seemed to be limited due to the deficiency in comprehensive
awareness of the benefits of the green roof concept among construction stakeholders.
Though the global studies on green roof application are widespread among different
green roof types, their results do not indicate any consistency between green roof
application and climate. This warrants the current study to investigate the benefits
offered by green roofs in the local context. A thorough literature synthesis had initially
conducted to review the green roof concept, types of green roofs, and benefits offered.
Subsequently, a preliminary investigation was performed to identify the green roofs
available in Sri Lanka. Thereafter, the case study strategy was adopted to evaluate the
benefits of intensive and semi-intensive green roof types through interviews. The
collected data were analysed using manual content analysis. Analysis revealed that both
intensive and semi-intensive type offers key benefits such as energy conservation, and
stormwater run-off reduction in the Sri Lankan context. In addition, the intensive type
offers benefits such as carbon emission control, and absorption of urbanized noise which
can be aligned with the main criteria of sustainable sites, energy & atmosphere, and
indoor environment quality of green rating systems. Therefore, the study suggests that
an adequate recognition to green roof implementation in the green rating systems would
enhance the green roof application and thereby contribute to achieving sustainability of
buildings in terms of these criteria.
