Godrej & Boyce Mfg Ltd Oberoi Mall

Oberoi Mall: India’s First LEED Gold Rated Mall under EBO&M category (Existing
Building Operation & Maintenance)

Shopping Malls are the emerging trend in the Retail Industry. Emergence of Malls has proved
that shopping is no longer just a buying activity - it has become synonymous with splurging time
and money. Along with 100’s of global brands, inclusion of amenities like restaurants,
multiplexes, games arena and car parks etc. has translated a Mall into a complete family
hangout place. Mall operators are continuously focusing on strategies to enhance comfort,
luxury and suitability to attract more and more consumers.
Thus over years Malls have grown and have transformed into a big enclosed building.
Air-conditioning has become absolute necessity rather than luxury which operates through-out
the day to provide desired level of comfort and respite from the heat outside. Bright and
colorful lighting draws attention of consumers to each and every corner. Escalators, elevators
ensure minimum fatigue.
However the flip side of such transformation is that millions of units of electricity is consumed,
Gallons of liters of water is wasted and Tons of waste is generated.
At one side there is shortage of electricity, Millions living in darkness with limited water supply
even for drinking. Rise in pollution & CO2 emissions resulting in global warming and climate
change. Thus at times where the resources are scarce, lots of questions arises on such a
transformation.

Thus when the very existence of Malls is being questioned, “Oberoi Mall” at Mumbai has
demonstrated that even such resource intense buildings can coexist in harmony with
environment, economy and the entire society.

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Oberoi Mall at Goregaon Mumbai, demonstrated sustainable performance and has become
the first mall in India to achieve USGBC LEED Existing Building Rating System under Operation
& Maintenance Category.

Green Building: Green Building is a one which consumes less water, is energy efficient, uses eco-friendly building
materials, generates less waste and apart from that provides comfortable environment for its inhabitants
USGBC: United States Green Building Council is a certifying body which evaluates and certifies the building
demonstrating the sustainable performance as a Green Building
LEED: LEED stands for Leadership in Energy Efficiency & Environmental Design. It is basically a set of standards used
to design, build and operate a Green Building
EB O&M: It stands for Existing Building Operation and Maintenance. It is one of the categories of LEED in which the
operational buildings can be rated as Green. It consists of set of standards and best management practices

About Oberoi Mall:

Oberoi Mall was constructed in the year 2007 by Oberoi Realty, one of India's premiere real
estate developers. The mall is a part of the sprawling 80-acre Oberoi Garden City, a self-
sufficient integrated township with magnificent residential and office space development, an
international school, state-of-the-art mixed-use building with 5-star hotel - The Westin Mumbai
Garden City and large landscaped gardens.

Oberoi Mall offers world-class retail and entertainment complex with the most stylish global
brands on offer in a plush and elegant ambience. Oberoi Mall is meticulously planned with
excellent design aesthetics to create an elegant and high quality shopping experience.

Project Title Oberoi Mall

Year 2007
Total Site Area 16652 Sqmtrs
Number of floors G+4
Number of Basements 2
Retail Space 39292 Sqmtrs
Parking Area 26968 Sqmtrs
Employee 2136 Nos
Average Visitors (FTE) 3347 Nos
Average Footfalls 7.2 Lacs/Month
Stores / Kiosk 104/21 Nos
Landscaped area 2897 Sqmtrs
Operating Hours 12 Hrs/day

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Why Green?

With growing Mall footprints in India, Oberoi Realty wanted to prove that sustainable practices
can reduce environmental impacts of resource intensive buildings like Malls. With more than
5 years of operation, Oberoi Mall had already gained tremendous popularity and occupied
significant position in mind’s of customer’s and retailers. Now along with meeting business
goals and strategies, Oberoi Realty wanted to contribute to the environment by conserving and
utilizing resources efficiently. Operators of the Mall thought that if high performance,
affordable and environmentally sound practices are successfully implemented in their building,
it could evolve new trend in the entire retail industry. This would not only promote good and
green culture but also give a thrust to adoption of Sustainable practices in field of O&M.

With this intent Oberoi Mall decided to go in for Green Building certification under LEED
EB – O&M category.

LEED EB O&M

LEED EB O&M is a Green building rating system developed by USGBC which is exclusively
applicable for operational building.

LEED EB O&M Categories LEED EB O&M Certification level

Categories Possible Prerequisites Categories Range
Points
Sustainable Sites 26 0 Certified 40 - 49
Water Efficiency 14 1 Silver 50 - 59
Energy and Atmosphere 35 3 Gold 60 - 79
Materials and Resources 10 2 Platinum 80 - 110
Indoor Environmental Quality 15 3
Innovation in Operations 6 0
Regional Priority Credits 4 0
Total 110 9

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Challenges:

As the building considered for certification was Mall, there were lots of challenges which the
project team had to face.
• Mall had more than 100’s of retailers with 1500+ regular occupants and 3000+ visitors.
There were different uses in the Mall i.e. Retails, Restaurants, Food Court, Movie
Theater, Games arena etc.
• Energy & water Consumption was a major area to focus but there was limited scope in
reduction of the same without impacting the normal operations and the comfort for
consumers.
• As this was one of the very first projects of its kind, there was Lack of awareness of
various international standards, certifications and guidelines available as per LEED
USGBC standards (GS, SCAQMD, San-Francisco Tier III, FDA, APPA, I-Beam etc.).
• Lack of local market to procure goods and materials complying with these global
standards.
• As this mall was already operational and running successfully motivating and sensitizing
retailers to participate in the process was itself a task.
• Huge parking areas is a disadvantage, as consumption related to same is added without
the area being taken into calculation.
To over-come this challenges the Oberoi Mall engaged Godrej & Boyce as their Green Building
consultant to guide them through the entire process of certification. Godrej & Boyce provided
them with comprehensive Green Building Solution which included Facilitation, Retro-
Commissioning and Waste Stream Audit.

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Green Features of the Mall:

The Oberoi Mall were already implementing some of the best practices and thus wanted to get
acknowledgement for their efforts. Similarly they also wanted to adopt some of the
international standards in their process. Some of their efforts are as highlighted below:

1. Sustainable Sites:

a. Building Exterior & Hardscape Maintenance: Use of environmentally preferred

practices for maintaining building exteriors. Using of manual methods effectively
to maintain high level of cleanliness. Using Green Seal Certified chemicals for
cleaning activities. (As an improvement the project here switched to 100% Green
Seal Chemicals for exterior housekeeping activity)

b. Alternative Commuting Transportation: Conducting survey and demonstrating

than more than 85% of the regular building occupants use mass/public
transportation. (The project made a special efforts by conducting survey in which
more than 1000’s of the occupants participated)

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c. Storm water quantity control: Adequate green areas are maintained on-site to
reduce the rainwater run-off. Providing Rain water harvesting pits to harvest
more than 100 cum of water (15% reduction in run-off). Regular and on-going
maintenance activity for storm water system. (This was a regular practice which
got acknowledgement from USGBC)

d. Heat Island Effect – Non Roof: The building has provided 100% of parking under
cover i.e. in basement. (This was a part of building design which got
acknowledgement from USGBC)

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2. Water Efficiency:
a. Plumbing Fixture efficiency: The project was already using Dual Flush WC and
sensor based urinals which meet the minimum flow rates required as per USGBC.
However they retrofitted all their faucets with aerators which helped them to
achieve overall water use reduction of 43.6% when compared to USGBC EBO&M
standards.

b. Water performance measurement: The project had water sub-meters in place

which measures the total water consumption of the building. (The project
installed additional sub-meters to measure water consumption and took daily
readings during the performance period)

10000
9000
8000
7000
6000
5000
4000
3000
2000
1000
0

c. Water Efficient Landscaping: The project used 100% of treated water for
landscaping. (The project already had an STP which enabled them to get this
point)

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3. Energy Efficiency:

a. Energy Efficiency – Planning, Documentation and Opportunity Assessment: The

project already had a regular, planned & ongoing PM practices. Additionally
Godrej & Boyce documented System Description and Building Operation Plan.
Also G&B conducted preliminary walkthrough audit to ensure that the
mandatory requirements are met.

800000
HVAC - MALL
700000 CONSUMPTION
(KWH)
600000
500000 MALL COMMON
AREAS LIGHTING
400000
(KWH)
300000
200000 MALL COMMON -
RAWPOWER (KWH)
100000
0
UNMETERED (KWH)

b. Energy Performance: The project used Case 2 calculator and used Energy star
Portfolio manager to demonstrate energy efficiency which is 23 percentile over
the national median. The project already had energy management program in
place. They were constantly monitoring energy consumption and implemented
various measures to enhance the energy efficiency. Some of these measures
were already part of design and some were additionally implemented which are
as listed below:
i. CFL lamps for general lighting
ii. LED Lamps for hoarding
iii. Lux Level sensors for interior and exterior lights
iv. Occupancy sensors to control lighting
v. Hydro pneumatic pumps
vi. Sky Lighting
vii. Efficient air-cooled screw chillers
viii. Group control for elevators
ix. VFD for elevators, escalators
x. Automatic PF control
xi. Building management system for operating the building
xii. Secondary Chilled water pumping with VFD
xiii. Lighting Transformer

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c. Eco-friendly Refrigerants: The project used environment friendly HFC based

R-134 refrigerant for HVAC as well as for commercial refrigerators.

d. Existing Building Commissioning – Investigation, Implementation & Continual

Improvement: Godrej and Boyce for the first time introduced the concept of the
retro-commissioning to the Mall operators. The goal was to evaluate the current
performance of the building systems and identify measures to enhance the
energy efficiency. G&B did implement retro-commissioning activities. Oberoi
Mall also implemented some of the low cost measures as follows:
i. Chiller sequence control
ii. Replacement of belts and filters
iii. Water balancing
iv. Modification of operation logic of chiller
v. Adjusting chilled water set-point

e. Building Management System: The project already had a BMS which is used to
control all the major building systems. Specifically for the certification, the
project did calibration of all the sensors.

f. Energy Metering: The project already had energy sub-meters to monitor all the
major energy using building systems. Energy meters are BMS compatible and are
monitored online.
Electrical Total KWH/Day
35000
30000
25000
20000
15000
10000
5000
0
1
3
5
7
9
11
13
15
17
19
21
23
25
27
29
31

Elect.Total Elect Total STLY Electrical Budget

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g. Emission Reduction Reporting: The project used Energy Star Portfolio manager
for reporting the emissions. Emissions are based on the energy consumptions

4. Materials & Resources:

a. Sustainable Purchasing Policy: The project formulated the sustainable

purchasing policy which provides guidelines for purchase of eco-friendly
materials. The materials include recycled content, local materials from within
500 miles, FSC certified materials etc.

b. Solid Waste Management Policy: The project formulated the Solid waste
management policy which provides guidelines for disposal of waste. The
strategies includes recycling, donation etc.

c. Low Mercury Lamps: The project has shifted from purchasing normal lamps to
Low Mercury Lamps. They have made policy for the same and also have ensured
that all new purchases of lamp would be low mercury variant.

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d. Waste Stream Audit: The project conducted waste stream audit to identify the
waste generated in the building and means by which the waste is disposed off.

e. Waste Management: The project team ensured that the vendor collects all the
waste generated in the building and divert it in an environment friendly manner.

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5. Indoor Environment Quality:

a. Fresh air ventilation: The project has designed a AC system with fresh air
quantity which exceeds requirement of ASHRAE by 30%

b. No Smoking: Entire Mall & its premises are already declared as No Smoking.

c. Green Cleaning Policy: Green Seal certified chemicals were already used for the
housekeeping activity. However for the certification the project team formulated
a formal policy which provided guideline for use of green chemicals for
housekeeping activity.

d. Facility Alteration & Addition: The project team formulated guidelines which
would provide best management practices to maintain IAQ during renovation
activity.

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e. Occupant Comfort Survey: The project team conducted comfort survey to

evaluate level of comfort of the regular building occupants.

f. Sustainable cleaning products & materials: The project team uses Green Seal
certified chemicals which is the major cost incurred for cleaning materials

g. Sustainable cleaning equipment: Sustainable cleaning equipment (electrical with

variable feed pump and one which uses only water) are used for building
housekeeping activity.

h. Pollutant source control: The building installed entry way mats to control the
pollutants.

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6. Project Scorecard:

The project scored 60 Points and became first Mall in India to achieve Gold
certification under USGBC EB O&M category.

Score Summary LEED EB O&M Certification level

Categories Possible Points Categories Range
Points Scored
Sustainable Sites 26 18 Certified 40 - 49
Water Efficiency 14 11 Silver 50 - 59
Energy and Atmosphere 35 12 Gold 60 - 79
Materials and Resources 10 3 Platinum 80 - 110
Indoor Environmental Quality 15 7
Innovation in Operations 6 5
Regional Priority Credits 4 4
Total 110 60

Overall Benefits:
• The Oberoi Mall were able to demonstrate that even Malls can be operated with
reduced environmental impact. Through EB rating they were able to demonstrate that
water consumption, energy consumption of the Malls is within the internationally
acceptable standards.
• The retro-fitting of plumbing fixture enable them to get 30-40% water use reduction.
• They were able to formulate the structured approach for energy management activities.
EB rating helped to establish baselines and also provided them with platform to
continuously monitor the performance and enhance the overall efficiency.
• They were exposed to international standards by the tools like Energy star portfolio
manager. The Energy star portfolio manager also provided structured approach to map
the energy performance year on year. This also helped to map the current level CO2
emissions with respect to energy consumption.
• By conducting transportation survey they were able to understand that majority of the
occupant uses mass transportation. This would help the project to reduce the
environmental impact as pollution due to transportation was reduced.
• EB also helped to structure and align the regular O&M documents like checklist,
operational plan etc with international standards.
• Apart from water and energy, the EB rating also focused on the other aspects of
operation like housekeeping and waste management. Thus this enabled the Mall
operators to formulate and strategize environmental preferable practices even in these
areas
• They procured Green Seal Housekeeping chemicals which reduces impact on human
health

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• They conducted waste stream audit and were able to set up a procedure the map the
waste collection and disposal.
• They switched to Low mercury lamp which would further reduce the environmental
impact associated with disposal of the same

Green Education:

Oberoi Mall has always been sensitive towards environment and have also carried out various
activities in past to promote Green

Poster Programs

Environment Day Celebration Green Ganesha Celebration

Promoting Organic Competition for childrens

The project team has also earned one innovation point for spreading green message

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