Applicability of green roofs in Sri Lankan high-rise buildings: drivers and barriers

Abstract

Sri Lanka is experiencing a construction boom and there are many high-rise building constructions coming up. Thus, many adverse effects are associated with high rise buildings. Greenery provides several benefits to the environment and reduces these effects. However due to limited space in urban areas it is impossible to plant new plants, trees and vegetation around the buildings. As a solution green roofs can be adopted as they provide many environmental and sustainable benefits from rooftops. Though this concept is more popular across many countries over the past few decades, still implementation of this technology in Sri Lanka is new and scant. Due to the lack of past researches, awareness on green roofs is very low for professionals, developers, government authorities, building owners and general public. The aim of this research is to identify and analyse the potential of green roofs in high rise buildings in Sri Lanka. A comprehensive literature review was carried out on popularity of green roof in global context, types of green roofs, components of green roofs, barriers and drivers in implementing green roofs. The data collection was conducted through expert interviews and questionnaire survey. Expert interviews were carried out to validate the barriers and drivers identified through literature review in Sri Lankan context and questionnaire survey was used to identify the most significant barriers and drivers. Purposive sampling techniques was used for selection of the respondents. The data collected from expert interviews were analysed through manual content analysis and the data collected by questionnaire were analysed using RII method. The final outcome of this study finds that green roof is an applicable concept for Sri Lankan high rise buildings.