The RIICO industrial area in Kant Kalwar village, nearly 35 km away from the city on the Jaipur-Delhi highway, would soon witness big time activities when the construction work for International Centre For Environmental Audit and Sustainable Development will begin.

A Dubai-based consulting architect and engineering firm has been chosen to work as the consulting engineers for this building which is going to be an architectural marvel as far as designing is concerned.

The Dubai firm, Arkiplan, whose directors are Ajai Saran and Subhash Kalra, runs an architectural and engineering company with a unique combination of energy and experience. A member of the RKM group of companies under the sponsorship of Sheikh Rashid Bin Khalifa Al Maktoum, the company was selected by Comptroller & Auditor General of India (CAG) as the consultant in a global tender to build the international institute in 16 acre complex. This institute is being built by CAG after India was chosen as the centre for imparting environmental and sustainable development audit by the International Organisation of Supreme Audit Institutions (INTOSAI). The CAG has paid Rs 5.7 crore for the land to RIICO.

This would be the second international institute to be built by the CAG for training of international auditors. An institute(iCISA) for training auditors for information, system and audit is already functioning at Noida. The Jaipur institute would be imparting training in environmental audit and sustainable development at international level for 168 personnel drawn from all over the world.

J R Reenwa, senior deputy accountant general of Rajasthan, who is the nodal officer for the project, said it would be a green building and would strictly follow the norms laid down by GRIHA.

"GRIHA is an acronym for Green Rating for Integrated Habitat Assessment. Griha is a Sanskrit word meaning Abode'. Griha is a rating tool that helps people assess the performance of their building against certain nationally acceptable benchmarks. It will evaluate the environmental performance of a building holistically over its entire lifecycle, thereby providing a definitive standard for what constitutes a green building'. The rating system, based on accepted energy and environmental principles, will seek to strike a balance between the established practices and emerging concepts," said Reenwa.

Reenwa said the Rs 84.76 crore building would be a truly green building that maximizes the use of efficient building materials and construction practices and optimizes the use of on-site sources and sinks by bio-climatic architectural practices. It uses minimum energy to power itself and uses efficient equipment to meet its lighting, air-conditioning, and other needs.

"The International Centre For Environmental Audit& Sustainable Development will have academic block, hostel, residential bungalows and sports facilities. It will have solar panels fitted in 2000 square feet area and the walls will be constructed on a three-layered basis that would be heat resistant. The air-conditioning would be done using the chilled beam technology," said director of Arkiplan, Ajai Saran.