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Source: ONE News -
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A five-star rating system designed to give a better idea of how safe buildings would be in an earthquake is being set up.
The Quake Star project, which has the backing of the Earthquake Engineering Society, is based on a concept under development in California.
It was sparked by Christchurch lawyer Don Holden, who picked up a comment made to the Canterbury Earthquakes Royal Commission. He now hopes to launch the Quake Star system before the anniversary of the February 22 earthquake.
Wellington engineering consultant Dr David Hopkins, who worked as a technical adviser to the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority, said building assessments at present were too complicated.
A simpler and more reliable star-rating system would be useful for everyone from owners and tenants to insurers, bankers, real estate agents and property buyers.
He imagined owners of four and five-star rated buildings would display their ratings because it would be to their commercial advantage.
It would also be an incentive for people to strengthen their buildings.
"It will help create the market forces to accomplish much more than we have achieved so far to reduce earthquake risk in New Zealand."
Hopkins, a consultant for the Building and Housing Department, said the Canterbury quakes had prompted a lot of building evaluation in Wellington in particular.
At present the system involved engineers employed by local authorities doing "quick and dirty" initial evaluations of buildings.
It was then over to owners to get more detailed assessments to estimate how far they were below code.
Buildings were graded as a percentage of current codes, with buildings below 34% being rated as earthquake-prone.
"I've talked to people with apartments who say their buildings had gone down in value and they were going to have to spend many thousands per apartment doing them up," Hopkins said.
A rating system would mean that if they spent $20,000 bringing their apartment up to a good earthquake standard, there would be a better chance of being able to recoup their investment when they sold.
The star ratings would be assessed by a panel of engineers estimating a building's safety, the damage it might sustain and how long it was likely to be out of action after a major quake.
Holden said the Quake Star system, which could be funded by stakeholders and run by a body similar to the Green Building Council, could help speed up the process of rebuilding Christchurch, where insurance holdups were a major problem.
"The frustrating thing is that the insurance companies are saying, 'give us the information first' and this is a tool we can use to give compact information that says 'this building is safe'."
