EDGE at a glance
“Excellence in Design for Greater Efficiencies” or EDGE, is an innovation of IFC, part of World Bank Group. EDGE has been used in countries around the world, especially in the Developing Countries with the total of more than 12 million square meter has been certified. EDGE can be utilised to certify various building types such as apartments, office towers, warehouses, airports, hospitals, schools, etc. EDGE is a powerful software, a building standard, as well as a green building certification. EDGE is a measurable way for builders to optimize their designs, leading to a more investment-worthy and marketable product. The major difference between EDGE and the other Green Building Rating System is that EDGE only focuses in three efficiency strategy : Energy, Water, and Embodied Energy of Materials. There are three levels of EDGE certification : Certified, Advanced, and Net-zero Energy. You can find further information related to level of certification here. EDGE uses the local baseline to be compared to your projects, e.g. if your project is in New Delhi, India, the savings in your building project will be compared with the other local buildings, in New Delhi.
In more than 140 countries in the world, EDGE can be certified by two premier service providers, GBCI and Thinkstep SGS. For instance, if your project is located somewhere in Malaysia, you can request a quote from the two providers. However, if your project is in the country where the local GBC exists, e.g. Indonesia, you may contact the local GBC to start the certification process. Regardless of where your projects are, EDGE requires an EDGE Auditor to provide third-party audit to ensure your claim measures are according to the latest EDGE Guideline. In addition, it is strongly recommended to have an EDGE Expert in your project team to streamline the certification process and ensure the target certification are met.
The general process of EDGE certification is as follows:
Pre-Assesment process: I would recommend you to play around with the EDGE free-online tool to familiarise with the EDGE App and Efficiency measures. EDGE Expert can help you to provide consultation which efficiency strategies have the greatest impacts with the lowest possible cost.
Registration: Once you are comfortable with the certification level target, you can register the project in the EDGE App and pay the registration and certification fee.
Document submission: In accordance with your saving measures, you can submit the documents as stated in the latest EDGE guideline. At the moment, it is EDGE User Guide V2.1. In the near future, EDGE will update its baseline to the newer standard version.
Audit Review: EDGE Auditor will review the claimed saving measures and investigate the correctness according the the EDGE User Guide. Should the gap is found, EDGE Auditor will request clarification and/or additional document before submitting to EDGE Certifier
Certifier Review: Appointed Certifier will review the document to ensure consistency to the EDGE Standard.
Certification: It’s the time when you can market your building to the world! EDGE team will send you a guiding principles to market through EDGE project directories and other relevant marketing gimmicks.
If you are interested to know more about how to certify your projects with EDGE or how to tap to a new investors using EDGE, please contact us. Thank you!
