Green Building Certification in Lower Parel, Mumbai.

Lower Parel's office towers compete for the same occupiers as BKC, and rated floor space is part of that competition. A mill-land tower on a compact plot has little room for ground-level green or on-site renewables, so the points come mostly from inside the building: glazing, chiller efficiency, water fixtures, STP reuse and metering. We model those early, while the facade and the plant room can still change, and compile the evidence while the building goes up.

Lower Parel was the heart of Girangaon, the mill district, where textile mills with tall chimneys stood among workers' chawls. As the mills closed through the 1980s and 1990s, their compounds were sold and rebuilt under the city's mill-land rules, and the area is now a cluster of office towers, malls, hotels and high-rise flats. Some mill walls, chimneys and chawls remain between them. Plots are compact and built to the edge, and the railway and flyovers cut through. The rebuilding is not finished; redevelopment of older chawls and buildings continues around the mill compounds.