SWITCH-Asia

The Challenge

The housing sector contributes significantly to the local economy but also causes pollution and promotes unsustainable living. 18 % of total urban employment in Nepal is contributed by construction industries and there will be an additional need of 1 million urban houses from 2011-21. The sector imports most of its construction materials from India and China, thus creating large carbon footprints. To enhance sustainability, it is imperative to curb the energy consumption in the housing sector – both embodied in construction materials as well as during operation.

The Objectives

The project aimed at creating an enabling policy environment to promote sustainable housing; strengthening supply chains for sustainable housing and building capacity of SMEs to deliver household level green technologies and services, and stimulating demand for sustainable housing.

The Way Forward

• Established partnerships with the Department of Urban Development and Building Construction (DUDBC), Ministry of Urban Development, Ministry of Federal Affairs and Local Development (MoFALD) and three selected municipalities – Lalitpur, Pokhara and Dharan;
• Supported DUDBC in developing Nepal Green Building Guidelines which is currently under peer review;
• MoFALD has included Green Homes standard and norms in recently developed Building By-laws and Training Curricula for New Municipalities;
• The selected municipalities have developed incentive mechanisms to promote green housing in their plans and building byelaws. These include subsidy in adopting green components, subsidy in building permit fee, and acknowledgements of Green Home owners and SMEs;
• 35 SMEs producing hollow concrete blocks (HCB) in Pokhara and more than 60 SMEs working in solar energy business have improved their products and services;
• In Dharan, three SMEs started producing HCB, with two new SMEs are in process of establishing businesses. About 20 women groups started implementing solid waste management and roof-top farming.

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