Green architecture to help in climate change adaptation

Green architecture is seen to help in climate change adaptation and mitigation, an architect said.

"We often spend so much on post-disaster programs when we should be focusing on prevention instead. This can be done by improving our built environment," Architect Maria Luisa Daya-Garcia, head of LDG Architects, said during a press conference for the Asia-Pacific Health Islands Conference 2018 at the Marco Polo Hotel, Davao City on July 26, 2018.

She said member countries of the Asia-Pacific Islands are alarmed by the steady rate of climate change.

Garcia, who has been working on green building designs for the last 15 years, said green architecture is a sustainable method for creating energy efficient and environmentally friendly structures.

Apart from helping cut back on carbon emissions, she said green architecture can address the persisting water problem in the country.

"Together with green urban planning, it can greatly help in controlling floods, which which would lessen our cases of leptospirosis, and can provide an adequate supply of potable water, the lack of which has been the main cause of dehydration in several areas," she said.

Garcia also shared that

initial conversations made with other Pacific Island health ministers have revealed that they are looking up to the Philippines for knowledge sharing on green architecture.

“I think we are ahead of them in that department because we have been working on this for quite some time already, even before typhoons have regularly made their way to our country,” she said.