Great minds set to gather at the 10th annual Green Building Conference in Tshwane

South Africa’s capital, the City of Tshwane, will be the site of national and international knowledge sharing when it hosts the 10th annual Green Building Conference on 1 and 2 June 2016.The focus at Green Building will be on leap-frogging straight to the lasted thinking, innovations, and technologies,enabling built environment designers to imagine and indeed construct higher performing healthier buildings now and into the future.

The longest running conference of its kind in South Africa, the Green Building Conference forms part of Sustainability Week 2016, a platform whereby authorities from across the continent and beyond, together with private sector investors, business operators, professionals, and researchers examine their respective areas from a sustainability perspective, whether economic, social or environmental, and exchange ideas on how to improve and encourage sustainable development among cities.

Hosted by the City of Tshwane and organized annually by Alive2Green, Sustainability Week, which will run from 31 May to 02 June 2016, aims to advance the ‘Green Economy’ through the sharing of knowledge and experience across disciplines, sectors, markets and continents, while actively seeking to develop and accelerate sustainability-oriented pipeline projects. It will also call for delegates to re-evaluate their business context and the cause and effect of actions, while further engaging on key challenges and solutions which will prove to have a catalytic effect on the ‘Green Economy’.

“Green Buildings form an integral part of the Green Economy conversation, especially in South Africa where energy efficiency remains a focus and, as such the Green Building Conference is a much anticipated highlight of Sustainability Week 2016,” says Llewellyn Van Wyk, chairperson of the Green Building Conference, and Principal Researcher in Building Science and Technology at the Council for Scientific &Industrial Research (CSIR).

This year’s edition will be held under the theme “Building Smart”. The Necessity Imperative” and invites delegates to engage and exchange ideas around current challenges facing human settlements and strategies to manage those. The objective is to share knowledge and experiences, especially in the form of case studies, and find solutions, while sharing lessons of the past, international best practises, and perspectives from across a number of different sectors.

Speakers at the Green Building Conference encompass design, architecture, and urban development professionals from around the world whom have experience in regard to the theme, and will include a panel led by Jordi Farrando of Spain, a founding member of the Urban Projects Department of Barcelona City Council, lecturer at Politechnycal University of Catalonia and currently Secretary General of the International Union of Architects;Nela de Zoysa of Sri Lanka, the principal of Design Corp and founder of Nela de Zoysa Design Corporation, who has vast experience in the areas of Design, Design Development and Construction Management; and Buhle Mathole, founder of Kabu Design Architects.

Registration for the Green Building Conference and Sustainability Week, taking place at the CSIR International Convention Centre from 31 May to 02 June 2016,is now open. For full delegate information, schedules, sponsor and speaker information,visit www.sustainabilityweek.co.za. Should corporates or individuals wish to sponsor the event or book exhibition space, they are welcome to contact Annie Pieters at Alive2Green on annie.pieters@alive2green or (+27)21 447 4733.