Indian Green Building Council’s annual flagship event, the Green Building Congress, is where national and international stakeholders converge to share and learn the latest and emerging green building technologies and to forge new partnerships. The 14th edition of Green Building Congress was organised on October 5-8 in Mumbai. It evoked enthusiastic response from stakeholders, including international leaders of the Green Building Movement in the Asia Pacific region. It helped to consolidate India’s leadership position on the global green buildings map. The theme of the Green Building Congress 2016 was ‘Sustainable Built Environment for All’. The topics covered included green products, materials and technologies, green homes and affordable housing, green existing buildings, green schools and green residential societies. The key speakers were Suresh Prabhu (Central Minister for Railways), Chandrakant Bachchu Patil (Maharashtra Minister for Revenue, Relief and Rehabilitation, and Public Works), Ashish Kumar Singh (Principal Secretary, PWD), Dr. Mangu Singh (MD, Delhi Metro Rail Corporation), Ar. Tai Lee Siang (Chair, World Green Building Council), Ross Shuster
(President, International Operations, UTC Climate), Bruno Lafont (Co-Chairman, Lafarge Holcim, France), Dr. Fabrice Didier (Group Director of Marketing, Saint-Gobain), Rakesh Sharma (India’s first cosmonaut), Dr. Felix Padel Darwin (Great-great-grandson of Charles Darwin) and Bahar Dutt (CNN TV). The highlights of Green Building Congress 2016 were:

• WGBC’s Asia Pacific Regional Network Meeting 2016, hosted for the first time in India.
• Presentation of WGBC’s Asia Pacific Leadership Awards 2016. The awardees in various categories were: DMRC (Sustainability), 69 Robertson Street – Floth, Australia (Sustainable Design and Performance – Commercial), Double Cove, Hong Kong (Sustainable Design and Performance – Residential), ZCB by Construction Industry Council, Hong Kong (Sustainable Design and Performance – Institutional).
• Launch of five IGBC Green Building Ratings – Existing MRTS, Health Care Facilities, Data Centres, Villages and Railway Stations.

• Dholera Special Investment Region (SIR), covering 49,000 acres, was awarded the first IGBC Green Cities Platinum Rating.
• Five villages were awarded IGBC Green Villages Rating; each village Sarpanch, including one lady Sarpanch, came to the event to personally receive the award. The villages are: Mawlynnong (Meghalaya), Tilpat (Haryana), Mori-Moripodu (Andhra), Punsari (Gujarat) and Bhond (Haryana).
• Two places of worship were awarded IGBC Reverent Green Rating – Badriya Jum’a Masjid, Kodi and Siddhivinayak Temple, Mumbai.
• Signing of two MoUs – with ISHRAE to develop indoor environment quality standard for India, and with DMRC for sharing best practices.
• 150 certified green building projects were presented IGBC plaques and certificates.
• 47 IGBC Leaders were presented IGBC Fellowship Awards – a new initiative of IGBC.
• Fifteen senior persons from the construction industry were presented IGBC Green Champion Awards: Pranav Ansal, Ansal Properties; Ravi C Raheja, K Raheja Corp; Pirojsha Godrej, Godrej Properties; Farokh Nariman Subedar, Tata Sons; Anuj Munot, Kalpataru; Niranjan Hiranandani, Hiranandani Group; Dr. Anoop Kumar Mittal, NBCC; Dr. Mangu Singh, DMRC; Alkesh Kumar Sharma, Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMICDC); Ajay Bhadoo, Dholera Industrial City Development Corporation Limited (DICDC); Ajay Pandey, Gujarat International Finance TecCity (GIFT City); Vaishna Roy, The Hindu; M. L. Sinhal, Reliance Industries; Vir S Advani, Blue Star; and Arun Bhatia, Carrier UTC India.
• Release of the 2nd edition of a coffee table book on Green Buildings of India.
• IGBC Green League Awards presented to the top three finalists – a new initiative of IGBC.
• Awards were presented to winners of the annual Green Your School Contest and Green Design Competition for architectural students.

More than 3,000 delegates attended the 3-day conference and more than 5,000 persons visited the parallel exhibition of green products, equipment and components manufactured in India.