‘The Green Mentality’

Green initiatives

Spago Property Sdn Bhd (Spa­go) commenced operations in 1996 dealing in interior designs and fittings. From it’s interior designing background to its current property development activities the one constant had been its philosophy on deliver­ing quality in all its products and services.

Tony Su director of Spago re­counted to BizHiveWeekly that the company initiated its first development project, Tabuan Nusa in 2004. Innovative ideas and concept that were new to the market at the time were incorpo­rated into the design. The clever use of space, light and greenery were particularly highlighted in this maiden project. It was also one of the first projects in Kuching with fixed furnishing as standard options, so the homeowners could virtually move in with just their personal belongings. Tabuan Nusa managed to command one of the highest prices for units in the same category from other develop­ers in Kuching at the time.

With the recently completed 12 Villas, Kuching’s first million dollar development, Spago has embarked on another first in the market with a very high end gated and guarded semi detached hous­ing project with individual private swimming pools.

The primary assignment was to elevate this project to such an international flavour that it would be able to attract foreign buyers to come and call Kuching their home too. Many details were care­fully considered ranging from the road curb to roof designs simply to ensure their exclusivness, Su elaborated.

“Spago started as a design firm, but as we progressed we found that it was difficult for us to communicate our designs to other developers to incorporate in their projects, certain features that we considered unique and a must didn’t gel well with them. So we decided that we should do it ourselves to reflect our own commitment to our designs,” he said.

“Personally, being green to me is a mentality, a human character not just an idea or a product. It’s like humility or being honest. Some are just in built with the character.”

“Being green I believe should start at an early stage straight from the design stage to the con­struction of the building to the lifestyle afterwards. It isn’t just fitting in some energy saving lights and then leaving the lights on for the rest of the day, that just defeats the purpose.”

Su added that, “When asked if Spago is green or sustainable I’d say that those two are the same thing, being sustainable will indirectly mean you’re going green isn’t it? It’s still a matter of being environmentally more conscious.”

He elaborated that Spago was a business and in a business money spoke, but implementing these ideas had actually helped reduce cost and made the properties more desirable thus it only made business sense that Spago imple­mented these unique features and designs into the company’s products. What made it better was that his children were really into the green movement so he got to practice what he preached.

“Going green first of all needs to be practical and economically viable. There’s no point being a ‘hippy’ type of green, being green means being practical and really making sure that it is incorporated in the design itself. Green isn’t just a first world issue and it can be incorporated into everyday life, right here, right now.

“By keeping this in mind we’ve incorporated very simple and practical solutions for energy saving such as using LED lights for our projects such as Academia Lane. To help reduce heat we’ve planted more trees around the property and angled the building to try to face north so only the sides are exposed to the sun hence minimising heat in the building itself.”

He listed out other measures that were implemented including water recycling systems that were similar to water wells as well as using longer lasting material to minimise repair costs. These sim­ple solutions weren’t expensive and added value to the property, resulted in less repairs, lower electricity consumption and the list could go on.

“There is a strong misconcep­tion that being green must be expensive, when you think about it, there is a significant change in cost, consider this, a normal bulb may cost you less than a ringgit, an energy saving bulb costs you RM8 and an LED bulb may cost you RM80 but the thing is the LED bulb will not burn out in perpetually.

“So if you consider the cost of making normal bulbs, the number of times you need to change it, add in the cost of packaging and transportation as well as the cost of disposal. It all adds up. It will work out about the same, now consider the carbon foot prints they create and compare the direct difference, the LED bulb uses nine watts and lights up equivalent to a 27 watt bulb, that’s three times less than usual,” he explained.

A great part of the issue now was that going green was being used as a marketing gimmick he lamented. Green was not neces­sarily expensive and just because products were expensive that did not mean they were good. Su went rhetoric with an observation; were all expensive products good? Or were all cheap products bad?

“For now the more innova­tive technology is undoubtedly more expensive and before it really picks up here it first needs to be more innovative, give more value per cost or be cheaper in general.

“For example, solar energy pan­els comes in two components, the panels and the batteries. The norm is to charge the batteries in day to use at night with a resultant cost factor of 50-50, in more developed countries, even in the peninsular there’s fit in tariffs (FIT) whereby the excess power generated can be sold back to the electricity grid.

“Thus the electricity generated in the morning and any excess electricity during the rest of the day can be sold back to the grid earning you something and halv­ing your cost as you no longer require the battery and at night during the off peak, electricity is at half price.

“This will also help the state government as most industries work in the morning and shut down at night, the public can help ease the burden on the local energy supplier, enable the government to spend less money on it plus reduce electricity cost for the public,” he said.

“The only hiccup is that it is not implemented here in Sarawak where there are a lot of industries coming up. Once the government implements the initiative for FIT, then the cost becomes more viable, businesses will then consider this option as it will help lower their electricity costs. This isn’t a new idea, it’s just not been implement­ed here and perhaps it’s high time that these types of possibilities are explored to promote sustainabilty of businesses,” he elaborated.

Su observed that it was all a mat­ter of cost versus convenience. If it was convenient within a reason­able cost there really wasn’t any reason for people not to pursue the green concept. He cited another example that on some Saturdays supermarkets implemented a no plastic bag day.

For those who had forgotten they did’t mind paying the addi­tional RM0.20 for the plastic bag because it was a matter of con­venience with a very reasonable cost. But again this was where the green mentality came into play, for those who actually had the green mentality it was not the cost but rather the act of forgetting it that would come to play.

Though the transition was slow awareness was spreading. Getting more green developers was a matter of demand and if the demand existed, people would supply. However there was really no way to transition to being fully green as it would mean sacrificing one’s current lifestyle and living off the land like our ancestors used to. The next best thing to do was to try to minimise the carbon footprint.

“But for now we are glad that most of our customers are not only environmentally aware but they also demand that we do more. We offer a survey asking our cus­tomers if they would like us to go greener and apparently most of them demand it of uso. We ques­tioned them further by adding if the cost of the property is a little higher for us to go green will they still support the notion and again the majority said yes.

“For now I think that education is key and I admit that schools are doing their jobs. My children actu­ally scold me when I need to clear land for development so after the projects get done I go and replant the trees as I’ve promised my children. Although this seems like minor stuff and may not cause a huge impact, it isn’t just the action rather the mentality that’s more important,” he stressed.

“Innovation may not be enough to elevate the standard of property development. It must be innova­tion with in an environmentally responsible manner. Spago will continue to invest in innovation and creative ideas to create a niche market not only in the luxury sense but also in a manner that is condusive to our planet,” Su added.

It’s definitely worth a green idea that help saves the greens that are in your wallet.