Selangor has the largest number of Green Buildings

Green Building is not just a term or a definition.

Green buildings (GBs) help you save money through reduced energy and water consumption, and for housing development projects, in a long run GBs lower down the operations and maintenance costs. You can also apply this concept to a house you plan to build.

According to Eco-B Workshop 2013 which was held recently in Kuala Lumpur, Selangor has the largest number of GBI projects, meaning more buildings with the green concept accreditation.

Artist impression of Bandar Rimbayu, Kota Kemuning Selangor. Image credit: starproperty.my

Ken Rimba in Shah Alam is known as Malaysia's 1st Award Wining Green Township. Photo credit: budiey.com


The case for Green Buildings

Selangor is leading in terms of having the largest number of registered green building index (GBI) projects, totalling 166, with Kuala Lumpur following closely behind. The following is the list of states/territories in Malaysia with GBI projects:

No		State/Territory	GBI projects
1		Selangor	166
2		Kuala Lumpur	117
3		Penang	31
4		Putrajaya	21
5		Johor	16
6		Malacca	10
8		Negeri Sembilan	6
7		Pahang	6
9		Sabah	5
10		Sarawak	5
11		Perak	4
12		Kedah	1
13		Kelantan	1
14		Terengganu	0
15		Labuan	0
		TOTAL	389

There is a total of 389 registered GBI projects in Malaysia. Of this, 125 of them have been certified. The 125 figure includes the latest batch of certified projects announced at the recent Eco-B Workshop 2013 in Kuala Lumpur.

The latest batch includes:

• Tun Razak Exchange (township) under the platinum category, the highest classification for GBs under the GBI. This brings to a total of six projects falling under this category.

• Bandar Rimbayu, formerly Canal City (township) under the silver category, thus contributing to a total of 19 projects under this category.

• Ken Rimba (township).

• Ken Rimba Legian Residences (residential new construction or RNC).

• First Residence (RNC) by TSI Domain Sdn Bhd.

• Hotel Penaga (non-residential) under the gold category, the second highest classification under the GBI.

• Digi Technology Operation Centre (non-residential), which also falls under the gold category. This brings to a total of 28 projects under this category.

• Lam Soon Distribution Centre (industrial new construction or INC).

GBI Township rating criteria

The rating criteria for a GBI township involve six areas: climate, energy and water; ecology and environment; community planning and design; transportation and connectivity; building and resources, as well as business and innovation.


Source : The Sun - ePaper

Electric flowers have the power to bring in bees

It is common knowledge that flowers use bright colours and enticing fragrances to attract pollinators, but what’s not so widely known is that they also use electrical signals.

'Pollinating' - captured with Nikon D90 at | 200mm | f/4 | ISO-400 | 1/320 sec |

Nobody knew about this electrical attraction until biologists recently discovered that bumblebees can detect a charge and use it to determine which plant they visit. Charge detection may help bees decide which flowers hold plenty of nectar.

To investigate, biologists at the University of Bristol created artificial flowers, filling some with sucrose and others with quinine, which bees don’t feed on. Initially, the bees (buff-tailed bumblebees of the species Bombus terrestris) visited the flowers at random. But when a 30 volt field, typical of a 30cm-tall flower, was applied to the artificial plants containing sucrose, the bees detected the charge from a few centimetres away, and visited the charged flowers 81 per cent of the time.


Flowers use electrical signals

A bee lands on one of the electrically charged artificial
 flowers. Image:University of Bristol.

When a bee visits a flower some of its positive charge transfers to the plant, and further bees transfer more charge. This could show an incoming bee that there’s unlikely to be much nectar on offer.

“The last thing a flower wants is to attract a bee and then fail to provide nectar,” says Professor Daniel Robert, who led the research.

“It’s a lesson in honest advertising, since bees are good learners and would soon lose interest in such an unrewarding flower.”

It’s thought the electric charge supplements the other signals flowers use. Exactly how bees detect electrical fields is unknown, but the researchers speculate that the hairy bees bristle up under an electrostatic force.


Fact source: Daily Express Sunlife, 2/6/2013, pp.12

Pesta Kaamatan 2013 at Hongkod KDCA, Penampang

The peak of the 2013 state level Harvest Festival celebration at Hongkod Koisaan KDCA on May 30 - 31 was one of the most crowded but enjoyable ones, to say the least.

If you were to visit Kota Kinabalu this month, this is one that you must not  miss. You missed it and you missed one of  Sabah's rich heritages.

My family and I visited the celebration curtain-closing site and I took some shots of the rich variety of cultures on display, some of which I shared here:

Big crowd thronged the 'village'

Ethnic Bisaya from Beaufort district. Seen here are young lads playing the kulintangan and gongs.

All smile. Ethnic Dusun ladies from Ranau district obliging to a request from a tourist wanting to bring home sweet memories.

Kadazan attires from Papar district. Easily distinguishable from the siung, the headgear worn by the young ladies

Visitors walking towards the big wakid stuffed with harvested rice and a storage made of wood bark.


..and many many more pictures I can't share here. You have to visit Sabah to experience it. I can assure you this - a two day spend here is well worth your time.