‘Cura’ is Grosvenor’s latest net zero ready development in Ginza, Japan with 13-storey retail and office space. It will be one of Japan’s first net zero ready commercial high-rise buildings equipped with onsite solar energy. It is also Grosvenor's first net zero ready development in APAC. Cundall’s sustainability team in Hong Kong is providing sustainable design and net zero carbon consultancy for this project.
The building was designed with sustainability and design at its forefront. By integrating low carbon design in the initial design stage to boost performance savings, energy and carbon emission savings will be prioritised throughout the building design stage as well as the operational stage. To ensure the project’s long-term sustainability goals were achieved and to ultimately create a net zero enabled building as technology advances and planned upgrades, Cura is designed to meet the sustainability requirements in the most time and cost-effective manner.
One of our net zero carbon recommendations was to integrate design enhancements to reduce landlord area energy use by 32% while generating 12% through onsite renewables. Cura is expected to achieve an overall 44% reduction in landlord operational energy use. This will enable the building to achieve its net zero carbon status by 2030 with the assistance of renewable energy procurement and carbon offsetting. Simultaneously, 98.6% of waste was recycled during the demolition of this building, which represents a high rate of recycling within the industry.
Cundall's structural team has also provided a valued added service in parallel, by developing an integrated digital structural optimisation and carbon accounting tool through the parametric approach. This is greatly beneficial to the project as it provides a much clearer visual of the possible carbon reduction opportunities along with structural design interaction, and ultimately facilitate the decision-making process.
Other adopted net-zero carbon strategies including using low CO2 concrete in a steel structure to reduce embodied carbon during construction. Using the recently approved low carbon concrete developed by Tokyu Construction, the embodied carbon during construction stage is significantly reduced. Cura is also the first project in Japan to adopt this innovative material for construction.
With considerations on the sustainability benefits that this net zero ready building can bring in the long run, Grosvenor has carefully selected the prime area of Ginza 5-chome as the location for Cura. They hope this project can act as an example to influence their industry peers and create positive impacts to the environment and the community in the city of Tokyo.
Grosvenor has pledge to achieve net zero carbon operational emissions from all of their directly managed buildings globally by 2030, and all buildings, directly and indirectly managed, being embodied and operational net zero across their portfolio by 2050.
The project is due to be completed by December 2022. For more information on sustainable design and structural optimisation, please get in touch with Jonathan Yau, Sustainability lead in Hong Kong.
