How a mandate of minimum green building standards influences green building adoption in the private housing sector: Evidence from Singapore during 2005-2019

Imposing minimum green building (GB) standards is a regulatory tool for governments to engage the private sector in building green, but there is little evidence on policy outcomes. This paper looks at the details of minimum GB standards mandated in Singapore in 2008 and critically investigates whether, and to what extent, they affect GB adoption in the private housing market during 2005-2019 using data for 1078 projects and associated transactions. After the mandate, a new type of entry-level, low-performing GB that simply meets the minimum GB standards but is not Green Mark certified prevails in the private housing market. High-performing, certified GBs only slightly increase from 15 % of the market to 23 % in the years after the mandate. Further empirical analysis using logistic and hedonic regression methods shows that small and medium developers tend to build entry-level GBs for tradeoff between GB performance level and cost, while large developers are 7.8 times more likely to build and certify high-performing GBs. These results suggest that mandating minimum GB standards rather than GB certification can stimulate widespread adoption of GB practices in the private sector, but inadequately promotes high-performing GB development and offset the adverse effect of cost on developers' building green.