The Global Sustainability Assessment System (GSAS) [Originally QSAS] is a green building certification system developed for Gulf Cooperation Council countries. This system was announced after QSAS [Qatar sustainability assessment system] got acceptance from many of the GCC countries. Hence, the local system of QSAS was expanded to a regional scale and renamed into GSAS.
Contents
GSAS was established in 2009 by the Gulf Organization for Research and Development (GORD) [a non-profit organization] with the collaboration of University of Pennsylvania. The system took into consideration well-known international green building codes, applied expert composition and modified them to suit Gulf Cooperation Council countries' climate and traditions. The system was recently adopted by State of Kuwait and Saudi Green building Council [SGBC].
Building Schemes
GSAS includes several building schemes as follows:
-Classical Schemes
• Districts (NH)
• Commercial
• Residential
• Education
• Core & Shell
• Hospitality
• Healthcare
-Unique Schemes
• Sports Facilities
• Mosques
• Light Industries
• Parks
• Railways
• Infrastructure
• Workers Accommodation
-Construction Scheme (Construction Practices)
-Operations
Features
Ground-up Approach: Seamless integration between sustainability practices and regional requirements.
Best Mix: Combines the best features from the world’s most established sustainability rating systems.
Performance-based: A quantifiable and result-oriented rather than feature oriented approach.
Flexible: Individual components are adaptable to any project of any scale without compromising the system integrity.
Control: Affords complete control over the development, customization, deployment and future modifications or expansion of the rating system based on any set of specific requirements.
Categories and Weights
GSAS is divided into 8 sustainability fields - categories -. Those categories are weighted based on their impact toward sustainability.
-Energy (E) 24%
-Water (W) 16%
-Indoor Environment (IE) 16%
-Cultural & Economics (CE) 13%
-Site (S) 9%
-Urban Connectivity (UC) 8%
-Materials (M) 8%
-Management & Operations (MO) 6%