黑洞社区

Roderic Bun, BSRIA information manager has told MPs that government targets for carbon emissions will not be met if post occupancy service levels in buildings are not improved.

In a speech to the All Party Parliamentary Group on 黑洞社区 Engineering on June 30, Bunn said buildings project teams were not being given enough chance to return to buildings once they were occupied, and proposed adopting a new framework for handover to occupants, called Soft Landings.

鈥淚n the March budget statement, the Government pledged that every new non-domestic building must be zero-carbon from 2019, with public-sector buildings required to be zero-carbon by 2018,鈥� he said. 鈥淎ll new homes and schools will be zero carbon from 2016. That鈥檚 just eight years away.鈥�

The ambitious targets would be impossible without an overhaul in the way buildings are handed over to occupants.

鈥淐onstruction professionals are rarely commissioned to follow-through afterwards, to pass on knowledge to the occupiers and management, and to learn from the experience themselves. Consequently, we don鈥檛 really understand what we鈥檙e delivering; we don鈥檛 understand what works, and we don鈥檛 know what needs to be improved. So we鈥檙e not delivering the best value in the buildings we create.

There鈥檚 uncomfortable credibility gap between design aspiration, and reality. But we can鈥檛 kid our way to a low carbon future

鈥淭here鈥檚 uncomfortable credibility gap between design aspiration, and reality. But we can鈥檛 kid our way to a low carbon future. We鈥檝e got to deliver, and that means we have to get real. And we鈥檝e got to be able prove it.鈥�

The Soft Landings framework, designed to run for as long as three years following occupancy, would allow project teams to work with new occupants to iron out glitches with building controls and make sure commitments to carbon targets were met.

The framework, 鈥渟eeks to enable a closer match between the expectations of the client and the building users, and the predictions and aspirations of the project team,鈥� said Bunn.

鈥淭o achieve this, designers and constructors need to have a greater involvement after handover. They need to be there to hand-hold the users during the difficult period after occupation, and to stay involved up to three years thereafter, providing the kind of support, trouble-shooting and fine-tuning services that only a professional team can provide.