Abstract—The implementations of green roof have been widely used in the developed countries such as Germany, United Kingdom, United States and Canada. Green roof have many benefits such as aesthetic and economic value, ecological gain which are optimization of storm water management, urban heat island mitigation and energy conservation. In term of pollution, green roof can control the air and noise pollution in urban cities. The application of green roof in Malaysian building has been studied with the previous work of green roof either in Malaysia or other Asian region as like Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand, Taiwan and several other countries that have similar climate and environment as in Malaysia. These technologies of adapting green roof have been compared to the Green Building Index (GBI) of Malaysian buildings. The study has concentrated on the technical aspect of green roof system having focused on i) waste & recyclable materials ii) types of plants and method of planting and iii) green roof as tool to reduce storm water runoff. The finding of these areas will be compared to the suitability in achieving good practice of the GBI in Malaysia. Results show that most of the method are based on the countries own climate and environment. This suggests that the method of using green roof must adhere to the tropical climate of Malaysia. Suggestion of this research will be viewed in term of the sustainability of the green roof. Further research can be developed to implement the best method and application in Malaysian climate especially in urban cities and township. Keywords—Green roofs, vegetation, plants, material, storm water. I. INTRODUCTION HE prominent need of environment sustainability has led to introduction of green technology in Malaysia. Malaysia governments have taken initiatives to develop the green environment and culture into the public and government sectors including private companies and NGOs. The prime objective of KementerianTenaga, TeknologiHijaudan Air (KeTTHA) is to enhance the green technology and environment [1]. Prior to this, the Association of consulting Engineers Malaysia (ACEM) together with PersatuanArkitek Malaysia (PAM) launched the Green Building Index (GBI) rating system [2], [3]. The main objective of GBI is to give certification to buildings for green status. It is also the rating tools evaluating and valuing the green standard of a building. These criteria of assessment include energy efficiency, water efficiency, sustainable and planning management, material and resources, indoor environmental quality and innovation. M.A Fauzi is with the University Putra Malaysia (UPM) (e-mail: ashrafauzi@gmail.com). N.A. Malek is with International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM) (e- mailamnurhayati@iium.edu.my). J.Othman is with International Islamic University Malaysia (e-mail: jamilah_61164@iium.edu.my). One of the criteria of the GBI rating assessment is the installation of green roof. This has led the emergence of green roof technology in Malaysia. The green roof or rooftop gardens had gained popularity in the North American and European countries. The difference of green roof system is that it implements by growing medium or plants on the roof of the building. Depending on whether it is extensive or intensive, the construction of the green roof is being completely or partially concealing with plants. The entity consists of soil and growing medium [4]. It is also known as eco-roof, living roof or vegetated roof. Green roof is divided into two categories which are intensive and extensive roof. Intensive system have deep substrate consist of trees, big shrubs and many species of plants as in roof top garden and needs proper irrigation system. Maintenance is needed periodically with skilled labors. However, the latter has shallow substrate depth, with small plants and sedum and requires less maintenance [5], [6], [7]. There are researchers who classified another type of green roof as semi extensive. It is categorized as in between the intensive and extensive system, having covering 25% of the green roof area [5]. In some countries, green roof is sometimes referred as roof garden because of the garden like construction and scenery [8], [9]. The urge to implement green roof is important for the well being of next generation. Previous researchers have list out many benefits from research on green roof technologies in term of environmental, economics and aesthetics [11]. The current situation in Malaysia needs certain guidelines in implementing green roof, such as sustainable design, implementation and maintenance and utilizing roof spaces for green roofs. Also the obstacles of green roof have been reviewed [10], [11]. The differences of climate in temperate countries to tropical countries like Malaysia have caused problems in term of comparability [12]. The need to develop the Green Building Index (GBI) assessment is important, so that the local quality and standard will be at par with the international GBI of the relevant industries; e.g. GREENMARK (Singapore) LEEDS (U.S.A. and Canada), GREENSTAR (Australia) and BREEAM (UK). There is a need to compare with other developed countries, since each rating tool may be different in terms of climate and development status [12]. Besides that, the technology and method used in the green roof system by the developed countries were reviewed in order to suit to the Malaysian context. Therefore, the need to develop green roof guidelines is considerably important. This is done through evaluating of previous research on green roof in the aspects of climate, regulations, environment and public’s perception [10]. Muhammad Ashraf Fauzi, Nurhayati Abdul Malek, and Jamilah Othman T Evaluation of Green Roof System for Green Building Projects in Malaysia World Academy of Science, Engineering and Technology International Journal of Environmental, Ecological, Geological and Mining Engineering Vol:7 No:2, 2013 53 International Scholarly and Scientific Research & Innovation International Science Index Vol:7, No:2, 2013 waset.org/Publication/1385