The Sino-US Seminar on Green Buildings, sponsored by the Ministry of Construction and US-based companies Carrier and Otis, was held Tuesday in Beijing. Experts and officials from both countries discussed systems for rating green, or environmentally-friendly, buildings and the development of the green construction industry.
Green buildings, which feature high energy and water efficiency, environmentally-friendly materials, waste water treatment facilities and high standards of indoor air quality, are a rising trend in the domestic real estate industry. To date, six Chinese buildings have applied to the US for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) trademarks as green buildings. 
At the seminar, Jiang Yi, a professor at Tsinghua University’s School of Achitecture introduced the assessment system for green buildings for the Beijing Olympics, which is generally regarded as the country’s first green building standard