Smart and sustainable buildings in 2025: Key drivers for a greener future

By Yeo Choon Chong and Tsubasa Bolt,

/ EdgeProp Singapore |

December 20, 2024 12:21 PM SGT

Temasek Polytechnic, as Singapore’s first smart campus, offers a model for smart and sustainable facilities management. (Picture: Samuel Isaac Chua/The Edge Singapore)

As we approach 2025, the built environment in Singapore is poised for significant transformation. The facilities management (FM) sector is under pressure to adapt to evolving regulatory demands, cost pressures, and technological advancements. Three key drivers will shape the future of FM and enhance its sustainability: the mandatory energy improvement regime, the impact of rising temperatures on energy costs, and the growing trend towards adaptive reuse in construction.

Climate disclosures, tighter regulations: A catalyst for energy efficiency

The Mandatory Energy Improvement regime, which will begin in 3Q2025, will require existing energy-intensive buildings to undergo energy audits and implement energy-efficiency improvement measures. This mandate applies to commercial, healthcare, institutional, civic, community, and educational buildings with a gross floor area exceeding 5,000 sq m. Buildings are required to reduce their energy usage intensity by 10% from pre-energy audit levels — an achievable target by implementing the right strategies.

Asset owners are encouraged to take a medium to long-term view on capital expenditure-heavy investments in energy-efficient systems. The energy audits will generate energy consumption patterns, identify performance gaps, and guide asset owners on a strategy to prolong the lifespan of assets, reduce operating costs in the long run, and contribute to a more sustainable built environment. Building owners can leverage grants to help cover the costs of energy efficiency upgrades.

Temasek Polytechnic is Singapore’s first smart campus. It embarked on a bold ambition to digitise its campus operations in 2021. Temasek Polytechnic’s experience offers valuable insights into the future of smart and sustainable facilities management.

At the heart of Temasek Polytechnic’s smart campus is a suite of solutions that digitise campus operations, including facility booking, automating campus repair and maintenance work orders, crowd management and temperature control measures. These systems are aggregated into a common data environment that generates data, which is visualised, tracked and monitored at a control centre on campus to help campus operations teams decide on a strategy that keeps the building operational systems healthy for as long as possible to maximise the return on investment in these assets and reduce operational carbon levels.

Temasek Polytechnic’s experience offers a model for smart and sustainable facilities management. By embracing digitalisation, data analytics, and sustainable practices, the sector can drive sustainability, reduce costs, and ensure long-term operational success.

Another push will come from climate disclosure obligations for all listed and large non-listed companies with revenues of at least $1 billion and total assets of at least $500 million by 2027.

Rising temperatures and energy costs will nudge investments in proptech

Rising temperatures predicted for 2025 will exacerbate cooling demands in buildings, prompting more investments in predictive technology. Air conditioning and mechanical ventilation (ACMV) systems are already a major contributor to operational costs, accounting for approximately 60% of total energy expenses in many buildings.

Optimising energy systems is crucial in mitigating rising energy costs. Building owners can achieve this by implementing energy-efficient solutions such as energy recovery systems or thermal energy storage. Additionally, optimising chiller plant operations to match changing weather conditions reduces energy waste and costs.

At a city and precinct level, extreme weather risks such as flooding and urban heat threaten the health and performance of critical infrastructure, including drainage and plumbing systems. These systems keep precincts running smoothly. As such, a clearer understanding of climate change risks is steadily being incorporated into building operations. Singapore has witnessed several flash flood incidents, which have caused considerable damage to properties.

To mitigate these risks, building owners and city planners have the opportunity to leverage advances in web-based geospatial IT to help facilities and asset managers identify flood-prone areas or extremely heat-exposed spaces to drive a comprehensive operational plan that considers predicting extreme weather events to mitigate the risk of equipment failure and downtime, optimising chiller plant operations to match changing weather conditions.

The increasing construction cost is prompting a shift towards adaptive reuse, with the rate of redevelopment in Singapore accelerating over the past five years. Surbana Jurong (SJ) estimates that mechanical and electrical costs have increased by approximately 30% compared to pre-Covid levels. The rise in construction costs can be attributed to an increase in logistic shipping costs by 77%, labour costs by about 9%, and construction materials prices, such as copper (up 15%) and the shortage of mechanical and electrical (M&E) contractors. This trend is driving the adoption of smart design and engineering practices, including utilising collaborative common data environments to benchmark construction and operational costs.

Adaptive reuse as a response to rising costs

Platforms that support integrated digital delivery enable real estate developers and contractors to gain real-time insights into key performance indicators such as time, cost, quality, and safety. Proptech platforms, such as Podium, aim to provide a digital ecosystem that connects developers, designers, and the supply chain to deliver high construction productivity and promote sustainable building practices.

By consolidating data from multiple sources, all stakeholders across the various stages of the building cycle — from design to construction to delivery and operations — will be able to access valuable data on design, civil and structural engineering plans, construction materials and components at the delivery stage to drive deliberate goals to minimise embodied carbon levels. Data on structural frames, superstructures and foundations are critical when building owners have to decide whether to redevelop or re-use them, in other words, applying the adaptive reuse approach. Increasingly, retaining structural wall columns, beams, and slabs can save material, time and labour.

Post-construction, Podium can integrate with other operational platforms to track building performance metrics — energy, waste, water, indoor air quality, and occupancy trends — to drive operational carbon reduction goals. The utility cost of (ACMV) chiller plants very quickly spirals post-construction when buildings start operations to make up the bulk of the energy tariffs, at about 60% of total operational expenditure.

Smart buildings mitigate further cost pressures by maximising the life cycle of capex-heavy equipment, including ACMVs, lifts, and air handling units. This is done through a data-driven long-term life cycle approach that prioritises energy savings to offset energy tariffs from the capital expenditure in investing in the equipment. The investment in smart building infrastructure informs procurement, replacement, and retrofit programmes that optimise the equipment’s efficiencies, maximise return on investment, and, importantly, assist the building owner in complying with local and international regulations and sustainable financing requirements.

This is possible because sensors are able to monitor and track the performance of each component in a piece of equipment. Implementing predictive maintenance for ACMV equipment helps reduce downtime and improve equipment efficiency.

For example, sensors can be deployed to analyse the vibrations in the chiller equipment, which helps reveal wear or impending failure of the rotating equipment. Similarly, thermographic testing with heat-sensing scanners and imaging equipment can detect abnormal temperatures or heat buildup in the system.

AI-powered smart monitoring systems can be deployed to monitor various components of a building’s M&E system using sensors. These monitoring systems provide granular detail on the performance of each component to help asset owners make informed decisions about parts that need to be replaced within a specific period based on the type of defects and the regularity of the breakdowns. With access to detailed data, building owners can identify various options, including retrofitting or replacing entire systems, which can be prohibitive.

Yeo Choon Chong is the chief executive of integrated solutions, Surbana Jurong (SJ). Tsubasa Bolt, senior consultant, sustainability & resiliency office, SJ, is the co-author.

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