Determining Project Performance Requirements

UNDERSTAND NEEDS OF SPECIAL BUILDING TYPES

• The focus for commissioning varies based on the purpose of the building. Health care facilities are highly sensitive to temperature and relative humidity, as are museums, libraries, and archives. Laboratories require fume hoods to operate correctly, while data centers demand reliable power. 
• Some government and private sector facilities have special requirements for access control, internal security, and communication technology that are essential to their function. Sustainable buildings with highly energy efficient mechanical, lighting, and control systems must be designed, constructed, and operated properly to achieve their projected energy and water savings. Some buildings must meet multiple requirements. 
• Virtually every building will have building systems, assemblies, or performance features that could benefit from commissioning. Commissioning can be applied to all building types.

DETERMINE KEY PROGRAM GOALS & RECOMMENDATIONS

• All commissioning projects require detailed planning for project success. Cobeal includes key project personnel in the planning of the project commissioning to ensure the identification of all key program goals and objectives. Once these goals and objectives are identified, the Commission Plan is developed.
• Cobeal helps clients identify team goals, key tasks, and team member responsibilities so that the commissioning schedule can be developed. The Commissioning Plan is a living document that will need to be updated throughout the project. 
• Depending on the Owner's Project Requirements, design objectives and functional characteristics that need commissioning to verify building performance may include: 
  • Accessibility 
  • 24x7 facility reliability
  • Adaptability
  • Building pressurization control
  • Energy and water efficiency
  • Flexibility in audio visual systems
  • Functionality
  • Maintainability
  • Redundant and resilient HVAC systems for climate control
  • Reliability
  • Scalability
  • Security / Safety
  • Serviceability 
  • Sophisticated detection and fire suppression systems
  • Space and organizational process functionality 
  • Structured raceways for flexible cabling installations 
  • Sustainability 
  • Survivability 

DEFINE THREATS, RISKS, AND CONSEQUENCES

• In order to determine performance expectations and measures, Cobeal must have a clear understanding of the owner's key overall business objectives. 
• Cobeal will guide the team in establishing and documenting priorities by which project success will be measured. It is important for the owner to work closely with Cobeal to define business risks, occupant threats and risks, hazards, consequences, and impacts that a system failure may have on the overall mission performance of a facility, so that defined priorities can be integrated into the systems performance.

• System criticality, and the need for its performance verification through commissioning, is determined by examing how each system, assembly, or building feature, and the integrated aggregate systems, support key program goals and facility mission. 
• This may necessitate high-performance HVAC system design that provides constant airflow direction and pressure differentials between interior spaces under all operating conditions. 
• This type of building functionality can only be achieved through both systems and whole building-based planning, design, construction, quality assurance, and commissioning testing and verification of the operating systems under various conditions. 
• Download the Program Goals Matrix below for a better understanding of the critical program-system relationships that Cobeal addresses. 

CONDUCT KEY COMMISSIONING PROGRAMMING ACTIVITIES

• Many design and construction programs execute careful planning and programming that is embodied and encompassed in master plans, building engineering reports, special studies, feasibility studies, and program development studies. Yet, some building programs execute planning and programming only minimally given the myriad of business tasks companies already address. 
• Cobeal's successful commissioning relies on integrating all documentation to summarize that which is both general and specific to critical requirements. 
• ASHRAE Standard 202-2013 (Annex D) and Guideline 0-2013 (Annex J) provides a general format for developing an Owner's Performance Requirement (OPR) which includes: 
  • Project schedule and budget
  • Commissioning scope and budget 
  • Project documentation requirements (submissions and formats) 
  • Owner directives
  • Restrictions and limitations
  • User requirements
  • Occupancy requirements and schedules
  • Training requirements for owner's personnel
  • Warranty requirements 
  • Benchmarking requirements
  • Operations and Maintenance criteria 
  • Equipment and systems maintainability requirements 
  • Quality requirements for materials and construction
  • Allowable tolerances for facility systems operations
  • Energy and water efficiency goals
  • Environmental and sustainability goals
  • Community requirements
  • Adaptability for future facility changes and expansion
  • Systems integration requirements
  • Health, hygiene, and indoor environemental requirements
  • Acoustical requirements
  • Seismic requirements
  • Accessibillity requirements
  • Security requirements 
  • Aesthetics requirements 
  • Constructability requirements 
  • Communications requirements 
  • Applicable codes and standards 
• NOTE: This is a general list of programming documentation that will vary by project depending on scope, size, complexitity, and budget.