Inn 01 Innovation

Key contribution

Research and innovation is at the heart of Saint-Gobain’s strategy; in 2017, the Group was ranked among the top 100 global innovators for the sixth consecutive year. Thanks to its eco-innovation policy and devotion to eco-friendly building materials, Saint-Gobain is working on developing innovative glazing solutions that help reduce the environmental impact of buildings and infrastructure over their whole life cycle, while improving occupants’ well-being.

Aim

To support innovation within the construction industry through the recognition of sustainability related benefits which are not rewarded by standard BREEAM issues.

Requirement summary

There are two ways to benefit from the Innovation credits: either by meeting the exemplary level of building performance defined for one or more of the BREEAM issues such as Hea 02 Indoor Air Quality or Wst 01 construction waste management. Or by using an “approved innovation”: any technology, method or process that can be shown to improve the sustainability performance of a building’s design, construction, operation, maintenance or demolition, and which is approved as innovative by BRE Global.

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Our contribution

At Saint-Gobain, we encourage the development of eco-innovative products and solutions in the Group’s innovation portfolio. In the last two years, Saint-Gobain has developed innovations to improve comfort and sustainability in buildings, such as ECLAZ, the new generation of low-e glass and COOL-LITE XTREME 70/33, the latest innovation in high performance solar control coatings.

Our glazing can also be an asset for LEED pilot credits such as:

Ergonomics strategy: to promote healthy, comfortable, and productive work by designing the workplace to accommodate its users. Through its transparency, glass, used externally, brings comfort, productivity and well-being to occupants.
Bird collision deterrence: to reduce bird injury and mortality from in-flight collisions with buildings. Thanks to specially designed patterns and colors, our 4BIRD glazing makes facades visible for birds. A discreet but effective, permanent and bird-friendly solution.

Among service innovations, we have recently launched the “Glassolutions” e-commerce platform, where users can configure and order made-to-measure products, with instant costing, delivery scheduling, and order tracking. This solution works on improving the customer quality experience and efficiently optimizing work.

Also, to better meet architects’ needs, Saint-Gobain has launched the “Glass Pro” app, which stimulates a realistic image of different glazing products on the facades of a building. Going one step further, Saint-Gobain offers a new, on demand service of facade rendering, enabling customers to visualize and compare all Saint-Gobain glazing products on high definition images called “physico-realistic”.