Aliya Resort & Spa won the first-ever gold award - GBCSL Gold Award in GREEN Rating System of New Buildings

Aliya Resort & Spa has been recognized as a resort committed to Green and received the Gold Award in the GREEN Rating System of New Buildings, from the Green Building Council of Sri Lanka (GBCSL), the recently constituted not-for-profit organization responsible for Green rating buildings and Green labeling products.

High rating on the Green Scorecard

This award, the first of its kind presented to a recipient in the Hospitality Industry, was the first award to be accorded to the resort. ‘Green Building’ is a way of building structures to enhance our surrounding environment. While natural and resource-efficient features can be highlighted in a building, they can also be invisible within an architectural design. A genuine ‘green building’ takes a holistic approach to programming, planning, designing and constructing buildings and sites. The Aliya Resort & Spa complex extent is approximately 5.39 acres, and the total build-up area is approximately 1,018,500 square feet.

The salient green features of the Aliya project were highlighted in order to obtain a high rating on the Green Scorecard. Eco huts, optimum daylight utilization by proper design, proper environment management plan, landscaping with indigenous flora and fauna, a lake that was artificially created to store waste and stormwater of the area, water treatment plant, utilizing grey water to sustain the landscaped gardens as well as the agro-areas, and energy-efficient lighting were all factors that pushed up the scorecard to achieve Gold.

Keep the environment untouched

“A micro socio-economic system was modeled by creating the lake and introducing a small paddy field on the site,” acknowledged Aliya Resort & Spa Chairman Chandra Wickramasinghe. The design was to keep the environment as untouched as possible, which resulted in only one indigenous tree being uprooted and re-planted elsewhere.

“The site is green after all the construction of the built environment and hardscape was completed. The footprint of the built environment was calculated as only 20% of the entire site,” said Chief Executive Officer Chamin Wickramasinghe.

Affiliated with the World Green Building Council

The GBCSL is affiliated with the World Green Building Council with over 80 affiliated countries as part of its membership. The Green Building Council of Sri Lanka held its Awards Night 2013 at the BMICH with Chief Guest Basil Rajapakse as well as Minister Champika Ranawaka and Chairman of the Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority, Bashwara Gunaratne as Special Guests.

This blog post was originally published on the Daily Financial Times on September 23rd May 2014 and is available here.