This article first appeared in City & Country, The Edge Malaysia Weekly on August 24, 2026 - August 30, 2026

With about 85% of Malaysia’s population expected to live in urban areas by 2045, its cities will increasingly determine the country’s climate future.

In his keynote address at the recent Cities Climate Connect 2026 (CCC2026) conference, Deputy Minister of Natural Resources and Environmental Sustainability Syed Ibrahim Syed Noh said, “The future of Malaysia will increasingly be shaped by the future of our cities. We need cities that stay cool, manage water wisely and where nature remains part of everyday life, where technology solves real problems, and above all, we need cities designed not simply around buildings, roads and infrastructure, but around people.”

In her welcome remarks, Malaysia Green Building Council (malaysiaGBC) president Serina Hijjas said, “We can build healthier buildings, more resilient cities, stronger professions and a more sustainable Malaysia. I believe Malaysia has the talent, innovation, leadership and partnerships needed to achieve that vision. What is required now is our collective commitment.”

Organised by malaysiaGBC, with the theme “Where Sustainability and Innovation Converge”, CCC2026 was held at Nexus Bangsar South in Kuala Lumpur on Aug 12 and 13. The conference featured four forum sessions — the Climate Action Forum, Circular Built Environment Forum, Urban Resilience Forum and Future Cities Forum — bringing together built environment professionals to discuss climate action, circularity, resilience and technology. The two-day event drew over 300 attendees and featured 12 exhibitors.

The Climate Action Forum focused on the scale of the challenge faced by the built environment and the need to rethink how buildings and cities are designed.

MVRDV Architecture global director of research and innovation Sanne van der Burgh shared the firm’s approach to architecture and urban development, whereby waste is increasingly being transformed into materials for new projects. Old beer bottles were crushed and made into a new material resembling jade for a Bvlgari store, while fishnets collected from the ocean were processed into 3D-printed filament for a Tiffany & Co store.

Van der Burgh also pointed out how projects in Southeast Asia incorporate nature through canopies, shade and public spaces. “Large developments can be opened up to make it human scale, breezy, inviting people in and creating connections that cities need,” she said.

The built environment, however, remains a major contributor to climate change, with buildings responsible for 39% of global greenhouse gas emissions, she noted.

“Research has found a clear relationship between a building’s weight and its carbon emissions. The heavier your building is, the more materials you’re using. Designing lightweight structures can significantly reduce carbon footprints,” she added.

Van der Burgh said the solution could ultimately involve transforming existing buildings, creating public spaces and designing with water, green networks and infrastructure that could deliver both environmental and social value.

The energy transition is another major consideration. Solarvest Holdings Bhd (KL:SLVEST) executive director and group CEO Davis Chong said the energy transition should be viewed through global, Asean and Malaysian lenses. “Globally, trillions of dollars are being invested in the energy transition, but the grid infrastructure system balancing problem is the bottleneck,” he pointed out.

In Asean, there is rising demand for electricity from data centres, while industrial development is driving the need for more energy infrastructure and interconnections, said Chong.

Malaysia is also seeing growing demand for electricity, particularly from data centres and conversions to electric vehicles. He noted that new energy generation would be necessary to satisfy the 7GW to 12GW of new demand from data centres alone over the next five to 10 years.

The country’s energy transition would require renewable energy, green hydrogen, bioenergy, green mobility, energy efficiency and carbon capture, utilisation and storage, he added.

“However, it won’t be done by policy alone. Public engineering and government policy must work together to clear bottlenecks and create greener cities,” said Chong.

C40 Cities regional director for East Southeast Asia and Oceania Murali Ram highlighted the need to connect climate action with urban transformation.

“Half of the world’s population live in cities, and urbanisation is rapidly increasing. Cities consume 75% of the world’s energy and face growing risks from climate change, including floods and rising temperatures,” he said.

In Kuala Lumpur, C40 is working with lower-income communities to co-create solutions for heat and floods, including cooling stations with shaded areas, misting fans and water supply. The programme is also looking at shade installations and natural canopies along connections between public transport stations and residential areas.

From a carbon emissions perspective, around 50% of emissions in the cities Murali works with come from buildings, followed by transport at 35% and waste at roughly 10%. “Cities are therefore moving towards compact, connected and regenerative approaches, with transit-oriented developments, people-centred public spaces, nature-based solutions and risk-informed planning.”

He urged developers to reconsider whether new construction is necessary. “Stop building. Just don’t build any more. Instead, existing buildings, malls and hotels can be reused and converted for new purposes, retaining the carbon that is already locked in them.”

The Circular Built Environment Forum highlighted that Malaysia’s built environment is not short of sustainable solutions. Certified timber, recycled materials, carbon data and life-cycle assessment tools are increasingly available, but there lies a bigger challenge in wide-scale industry adoption.

That was the overarching topic discussed during the panel discussion, during which industry experts highlighted the need for greater verification, reliable data and stronger regulatory support to move sustainability beyond voluntary adoption.

Moderated by Malaysia Green Building Council member Leong Sai Pink, the panel featured Malaysian Timber Certification Council (MTCC) CEO Farrah Shameen Mohamad Ashray, Rockwool Malaysia marketing and business development senior regional manager Logen Chetty and One Click LCA senior LCA (life-cycle assessment) customer success specialist Roxanne Del Rosario.

Certification is an important starting point as it provides assurance that sustainability claims go beyond legal requirements.

Representing MTCC, Farrah explained that the council is the owner of the Malaysian Timber Certification Scheme, which oversees the certification framework for responsible forest management and chain of custody. She added that forest certification encompasses issues beyond the management of trees, including labour practices, worker safety, chemical management, protection of water resources and the livelihoods of indigenous communities.

Certification also provides a chain of custody that tracks timber from the certified forest to the end product, with the process subject to third-party audits.

Meanwhile, Del Rosario pointed out that the credibility of information feeding into the decision-making process is equally important when assessing embodied carbon.

LCA depends on accurate information on both the quantity of materials used and the emissions associated with those materials. If the underlying data is inaccurate, the resulting carbon calculation will also be unreliable.

This is where the Environmental Product Declaration can play a role by providing verified environmental information for products, giving designers and developers a more reliable basis for comparing materials and making decisions, says Del Rosario.

However, even with better data and more sustainable products available, cost remains one of the industry’s biggest hurdles.

While circularity may be supported in principle, Farrah noted that project teams often prioritise cost under commercial pressure, raising the question of how sustainability could become the default rather than an option.

“We have been talking about ESG (environmental, social and governance) for a long time. Everybody speaks about it. It all boils down to cost,” she said, adding that some components need to be made mandatory.

Logen agreed, pointing to the significant amount of waste generated by the construction industry and the difficulty of driving change when sustainability is weighed against upfront costs. “If we don’t have a mandatory requirement in place in terms of circularity, you’ll not really see a drastic change,” he said.

Nevertheless, Del Rosario cautioned against viewing this issue purely through the lens of upfront construction cost. Instead, developers should consider the entire lifecycle of a building, including how long materials last, how often they need to be replaced and what happens to them at the end of their useful life, she said.

“We have to look at that throughout the life cycle. From there, we can balance the decision from a carbon perspective and cost perspective, not just considering year zero, but considering the future worth or the entire life cycle of the building,” she added.

Understanding life cycles is also important when distinguishing between low-carbon development and genuine circular development.

Del Rosario explained that circularity requires consideration of the inflow and outflow of materials, including whether materials are reused, recycled or upcycled, and what happens to them at the end of their service life.

That same thinking should extend to the building itself, including its adaptability and service life. For developers, this means circularity should not be introduced as an afterthought once design and procurement decisions have already been made.

“The most impactful stage would be at the concept stage,” said Del Rosario, noting that project teams could still consider material choices, durability and adaptability at that time.

Ultimately, the panel suggested that Malaysia’s transition to a circular built environment would require credible information to support decision-making, certification to verify claims, life-cycle thinking to move beyond upfront costs and policy intervention for voluntary commitments to be common practice.

During the Urban Resilience Forum, Think City senior director Matt Benson said Malaysia needs to pay greater attention to heat as an urban climate risk, alongside more familiar concerns such as flooding.

Using satellite imagery of Kuala Lumpur, George Town and other cities, Benson showed how urban heat patterns are influenced by greenery, building shade, roof materials and air movements. He said technology could help cities understand these changes, but should not be viewed as the sole solution.

“I’m not saying [technology is] not part of the solution, but we need to complement it with nature-based solutions and a return to tradition,” he added.

Benson highlighted simple interventions such as planting trees to maximise shade while preserving wind flows, and connecting parks and green spaces to form wider urban cooling corridors. In George Town, Penang, for example, trees along the waterfront would need to be positioned carefully to channel rather than block prevailing winds, he noted.

He also pointed to roofs as a frequently overlooked source of urban heat. “When we’re thinking about this urban cooling concept, don’t forget the roofs,” he said, noting that satellite imagery and thermal cameras could help identify the materials and surfaces contributing to heat.

Taking nature-based solutions further, Henning Larsen APAC Singapore regional director for landscape Jia Xin Chum said in her presentation that such solutions would need a stronger business case for cities to secure investment.

She added that stakeholders should look beyond the immediate capital cost of climate adaptation and consider wider benefits, including improved water and air quality, mental well-being and public spaces.

Chum said the process begins with identifying the benefits that matter most to local stakeholders, followed by data collection, simulation and assessment to determine the scale of interventions and their potential returns.

She illustrated the approach using projects in Singapore such as Bidadari Park and Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park. At Bidadari, the 13ha park functions as a recreational space and wildlife habitat and is part of a wider water management system, with areas designed to temporarily flood during heavy rain before returning to recreational use during dry weather.

At Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park, a 30m-wide concrete drainage canal was transformed into a naturalised waterway and multifunctional park, requiring close collaboration between the landscape and hydraulic engineers.

For Ramboll senior associate Hamka Ariff, the next step is to retrofit the city itself. He said climate adaptation cannot wait for redevelopment because most of the buildings and streets that will make up future cities already exist.

He also said existing buildings need to be assessed from multiple perspectives, including environmental sustainability, structural integrity, heritage value, human-centric design, financial considerations and their integration with the wider urban fabric.

One of Hamka’s key proposals is to treat blue-green infrastructure as “performance infrastructure”, rather than decoration. Instead of simply collecting and discharging rainwater, cities should capture, slow, store, infiltrate, treat and reuse water.

“Adaptation becomes investable when it solves more than one problem,” he said, noting that nature-based solutions could reduce flood risk and improve the microclimate. “We do not need to rebuild our city to make it resilient. Every street, building and drain is an adaptation opportunity.”

Sika Malaysia head of business development and specification Khiew Wei Yi highlighted the role of roofs and waterproofing systems in addressing rising heat and rainfall. She said cool roofs could reduce heat gain and the need for air conditioning, particularly in Malaysia’s increasingly hot urban environment.

Sika’s testing of cool-roof solutions recorded an average reduction of 6.5°C in outdoor surface temperature and about 2.3°C in indoor air temperature, she added.

Beyond heat mitigation, Khiew stressed the importance of considering future building requirements when selecting waterproofing systems, particularly where solar panels may eventually be installed. The wrong system or installation method could compromise waterproofing and lead to higher repair costs later.

“In retrofit situations, most of the time, we only look at current costs, but not future costs,” she noted, pointing to future maintenance and repair expenses as factors to consider from the outset.

For malaysiaGBC CEO Mitch Gelber, it is about whether buildings provide healthy and effective environments for the people who use them. He presented on Program Sekolah Hijau Kebangsaan, an initiative spearheaded by malaysiaGBC with the support of several federal ministries and the Embassy of Denmark, among others.

The initiative aims to create healthier, more climate-responsive and energy-efficient learning environments through practical, scalable retrofit strategies for Malaysia’s public schools.

In his keynote address, Gelber said Malaysia’s schools offer a scalable opportunity to improve both environmental and learning performance.

The programme examined 10 schools under the first phase of a framework for assessing and upgrading the country’s school infrastructure. Gelber said the study found that existing schools had an average baseline thermal comfort of about 60%. Improving natural and mechanical ventilation could raise thermal comfort to 81% without requiring additional cooling demand, while air conditioning could raise it to 90% but with higher energy use and poorer indoor air quality if fresh air were not adequately supplied.

“Air conditioning alone is not the answer,” he said, noting that cooling without adequate fresh air could improve temperatures but compromise on indoor air quality and concentration.

The Future Cities Forum explored how digital twin models — virtual, real-time simulations of the built environment — can assist with more intelligent asset management decisions. The examples presented ranged from individual buildings and townships to citywide applications in Singapore.

The technology is emerging to de-risk capital investments, cut carbon footprints, optimise energy usage and refine urban planning across building life cycles and township developments.

IESVE Singapore Pte Ltd Asia-Pacific business head Rohan Rawte detailed how physics-based digital twins of buildings can help asset owners navigate long-term building degradation.

He explained that the technology allows operational changes to be simulated before committing capital, helping distinguish low-cost operational fixes from major equipment upgrades. By modelling performance outcomes in advance, expenditure can be justified using reliable data.

“To make sure that a building maintains its high performance targets, money needs to be invested continuously to improve its different assets. Most times, the budget is not easily available and it is hard for teams to justify it,” said Rawte.

He noted that the value of digital twins depends on continuous recalibration over time. “The value of the twin is [realised] over its life cycle,” he said, adding that the model needs to be consistently recalibrated every few years for the best-supported decision-making. “Otherwise, after a while, the model starts drifting, and that drift means inaccurate results.”

Meanwhile, Future Cities Research Institute co-director and Sunway University professor of engineering and technology Rosdiadee Nordin presented the institute’s digital twin model applied to Sunway City Kuala Lumpur. He explained that traditional urban management suffers from fragmented data and reactive decision-making, which the initiative aims to solve by unifying these streams into a single city operating system.

The modelling evaluates solutions for Sunway City Kuala Lumpur’s traffic congestion, pedestrian mobility and last-mile transit links. Initiatives under the study include automating the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) network, autonomous taxis and testing kinetic footpaths to generate energy.

“We are working with Sunway Smart City on automating the BRT system … Because it is predictable in its route, it makes sense to automate it. A second step [being initiated] is extending the BRT lines to connect to the nearest MRT station to address last-mile connectivity, which is still a challenge even in Sunway,” said Rosdiadee.

He explained that the digital twin’s value lies in its data integration, enabling it to serve as an adaptive decision-making model for future applications.

“The job [of the digital twin] is not to replicate the city, but [to model its] learning process. A connected city is not simply a city with more sensors, but one that can learn through integrated and connected data, so that it can decide and respond according to the demands and needs of the community,” he added.

Singapore-ETH Centre climate modeller and researcher Adelia Sukma presented the Cooling Singapore initiative and the development of the Digital Urban Climate Twin — a project built to assess microclimate dynamics and urban heat island effects across the island republic.

Adelia explained that the climate twin integrates master planning, land-use data, building geometry, traffic demand and power plant emissions. “A digital twin of a city can be used to conduct ‘what-if’ analyses and perform experiments with a city that would otherwise not be possible in the real world,” she added.

The simulation identified built structures and air-conditioning waste heat as the primary drivers of localised heat. Adelia emphasised that combining passive design and plant-sensitive architecture with active cooling would yield the greatest temperature reductions, while building digital twins would foster cross-agency collaboration rather than replacing human roles.

“You may think [the digital climate twin] replaces human work, but actually, no. Because it’s data-intensive, with the data hosted by different agencies, people and institutions. People actually now realise, after we presented our work, that we need to collaborate now more than ever,” she said.

The research scripts for Cooling Singapore remain open for public usage, said Adelia. “I come from research, and whatever we do in research is open to the public. We are working for the public good, basically. So, all the scripts and datasets that we use in development are available online,” she added.

Meanwhile, Rawte addressed how data silos hinder urban collaboration. “Unless we all get together and use all the information we have, we will not be able to solve the problem at scale. Wouldn’t it be a beauty for all of us to share knowledge and collaborate on projects? But are we mature enough to do that? Companies have to be mature in balancing between doing the right thing and making money,” he said.

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