The Building Commissioning Association (BCA) officially released its New Construction Building Commissioning Best Practices. This publicly available document is applicable to most building types and distills the long list of guidelines, and longer list of tasks, into easy-to-navigate activities that represent the ideal commissioning process.
This document represents a collaborative effort on the part of several leading experts in the field of commissioning. Bruce Pitts of Wood Harbinger, Inc and Karl Stum of Summit Building Engineering spearheaded this two-year effort.
According to its authors, it aims to promote commissioning in the marketplace by defining the qualities and characteristics of best commissioning practices and to raise professional standards by establishing a benchmark against which the market can gauge quality and professionalism, and which the BCA can use to objectively evaluate other commissioning initiatives, including their own.
“I am proud of this Best Practices document,” stated BCA President Mark F. Miller, PE, CCP. “A unique and valuable aspect of this document is to identify several of the most common issues, pitfalls and challenges that BCA members see in the industry related to the practice of commissioning new construction and major renovation projects. Our hopes are that by highlighting these challenges and identifying proven strategies for overcoming them that this will heighten awareness and understanding and lead the industry to overcome these problems while promoting quality and standardization in the industry.”
New Construction Building Commissioning Best Practices draws upon existing resources such as the BCA’s own Building Commissioning Handbook, NEBB Procedural Standards for “Whole Building Systems Commissioning of New Construction”, National Institute of Building Science (NIBS) “Whole Building Design Guide”, ASHRAE Guideline 0-2005, ASHRAE Guideline 1.1-2007 and the USGBC LEED rating system.
Best Practices in Commissioning Existing Building is available in its entirety on the BCA website at www.bcxa.org. BD+C
Related Stories
| Jan 3, 2012
Art Gensler: Still Making a Difference for Clients Every Day
After running what is today the largest architecture firm in the world for more than four decades, M. Arthur Gensler, Jr., FAIA, FIIDA, RIBA, is content to be just another employee at the firm that bears his name.
| Jan 3, 2012
Gensler: 'The One Firm Firm'
The giant architecture firm succeeds by giving each of its more than 3,000 employees the opportunity for career growth and professional leadership.
| Jan 3, 2012
Rental Renaissance, The Rebirth of the Apartment Market
Across much of the U.S., apartment rents are rising, vacancy rates are falling. In just about every major urban area, new multifamily rental projects and major renovations are coming online. It may be too soon to pronounce the rental market fully recovered, but the trend is promising.
| Dec 29, 2011
OSHA enforcing new fall hazard standards
OSHA is enforcing its new fall protection standards, as evidenced by a recent crackdown in New York.
| Dec 29, 2011
Decision not to fireproof the new World Trade Center Transportation Hub criticized
Some criticized the decision, reasoning that the structure could be a terrorist target.
| Dec 29, 2011
Seismic safety in question at thousands of California public schools
California regulators responsible for enforcing earthquake safety laws have failed to certify more than 16,000 construction projects in California public schools, increasing the risk that some projects may be unsafe, according to a state audit report.
| Dec 29, 2011
GreenWizard offers cloud-based LEED credit management, assessment
The company recently began offering companies the ability to run assessments for design credits, in addition to traditional product-specific LEED credits.
| Dec 27, 2011
Clayco awarded expansion of Washington University Data Center in St. Louis
Once completed, the new building addition will double the size of the data center which houses sophisticated computer networks that store massive amounts of genomic data used to identify the genetic origins of cancer and other diseases.
| Dec 27, 2011
Ground broken for adaptive reuse project
Located on the Garden State Parkway, the master-planned project initially includes the conversion of a 114-year-old, 365,000-square-foot, six-story warehouse building into 361 loft-style apartments, and the creation of a three-level parking facility.
| Dec 27, 2011
Nova completes $60M Clearwater Conference Center
Comprising an entire city block, the 450,000 sq. ft. facility features over 400 meeting rooms, six theaters, a full-service health spa, complete with an indoor running track, and a commercial kitchen that can efficiently accommodate over 1,000 diners
