A room crammed with people at the seminar “Certificare la salute e il benessere nel workplace: nuove frontiere della sostenibilità” (Certifying health and well-being in the workplace: new frontiers of sustainability) organized by WOW! with Coima and Assufficio held at Coima’s headquarters, the ultimate green building, designed by Mario Cucinella, LEED Platinum and “cradle-to-cradle” certified.
The meeting was focused on the theme of all-round certifications and developers and interior designers were asked to expound their views.
Alida Catella, CEO di COIMA Image, explained why, as interior designer, she has opted for a cradle to cradle certification.
“I think that the designer should consider the interiors in a sustainable way. It’s useless to certify the shell LEED Platinum if the interiors don’t agree with this view. The need for consistency led us to introduce the issue of circular economy also as regards the interiors”.
See the article about Coima’s headquarters in Milan.
The right person to explain why investors and developers are interested in eco-sustainability is Stefano Corbella, Sustainability Officer at COIMA:
“Now sustainability is a key aspect worldwide of the development and risk assessment of one’s investment: pension funds, institutional investors and private banking cannot fail to take into account sustainability as a strategy in their investment.
It is a proven fact that climate change is a risk and therefore investors have to know how to handle that. In particular low-risk sectors have to measure and evaluate the sustainability of their investment.
That has an impact on building sustainability, which means certifications to valorize investments but also to mitigate the risk.
Elisa Sirombo, Sustainability specialist, Research Assistant at FULL (Future Urban Legacy Lab) of Politecnico di Torino, has introduced the rating system WELL.
A recent protocol, presented last October 2017 in Italy too, assessing all aspects of a building to promote welfare and health for the people living there.
WELL Building StandardTM is a rating system developed by DELOS and managed by IWBI (International Well Building Institute).
It’s designed in seven thematic areas dealing with the different aspects of the interior and it introduces strategies concerning the project, construction and management, that affect people’s physical, psychological and mental well-being.
Basically, it provides a path to combine and measure health and well-being issues for the design, construction and management of buildings, considering the built environment as a way to ensure health and well-being for the occupants.
See the article about WELL presentation in Italy.
Elena Veneziani, UL Environment Business Development Manager, has explained SPOT, the biggest data base free of charge and reliable, comprehensive and collaborative, of sustainable, green-certified products so far available. Since the data base also includes materials and trim, it’s a suitable tool also for industrial design and manufacturers.
On the subject of workplace fittings, Gianfranco Marinelli has pointed out the critical issues of the new CAM, obligatory since 2017, on public procurement in Italy.
The meeting went on informally with a party on the terrace.
Text by Renata Sias
