Comparison of Preproject Planning for Green and Conventional Buildings

Abstract

The importance of green buildings has been frequently highlighted. However, barriers such as greater complexity, lack of understanding of sustainability, and the perception of a greater possibility of cost overrun have hindered the dissemination of green buildings. More planning efforts for green buildings can presumably help mitigate these barriers. This paper investigates preproject planning efforts for green and conventional building projects. Project-level data were collected (124 in total, 71 from conventional building projects and 53 from green building projects), with project data consisting of general information about the project, a Project Definition Rate Index (PDRI) survey, and cost performance. The project data were categorized into four groups based on their project type (green and conventional) and cost performance (actual cost on/under budget and over budget). For the four groups, a two-way analysis of variance test was used to compare the degree of preproject planning efforts measured by PDRI. The analysis indicated that green projects tend to have more investment in preproject planning efforts than conventional projects, and the difference was marginally statistically significant at the level of