Study of green roof application in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Green roofs are one of the green practices, having widespread use in the European and Asian regions due to their numerous benefits. However, country like Sri Lanka is yet to experience its optimum potential application. Thus, this study investigates the application of green roofs in Sri Lanka in terms of current status of its application, role in the green rating systems and implementation barriers to enhance its application in Sri Lanka. Initially, a preliminary survey, followed by semi-structured interviews with green roof construction professionals was conducted where the collected data were analysed using descriptive data analysis techniques. Amongst the identified set of applications, residential and commercial buildings are the most common building types with the extensive and semi-intensive green roof types. Although the most commonly used rating systems of GREENSL® and LEED have various provisions, a very few out of number of buildings surveyed have incorporated green roofs. According to the green roof construction professionals, the application is limited in the Sri Lankan buildings due to fourteen (14) key barriers. Amongst those barriers, higher initial and maintenance costs, poor awareness of the public on the concept and lack of clients’ willingness on the concept are the mostly identified barriers by the interviewees. Hence, the study recommends taking necessary actions to mitigate the barriers in order to enhance the green roof applications on the Sri Lankan buildings to optimise the multiple benefits if offers.