Civil Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
competitive solutions. Of course this is not the only way of utilizing integrated
design and many other grading methods depending on the specifi cs of the projects
also can be utilized.
2.3
Energy Conscious-Integrated Design Approach
Delivering a successful energy conscious building construction project also should
start with an integrated effort from the early stages of conceptual design and con-
tinue throughout the whole process of delivery and even beyond it. A well-planned
scheduling and outcome targeting should be utilized in order to specify, monitor,
and verify each parties responsibilities at each step along the project life to guaran-
tee a successful outcome. The desired sustainability goals and energy saving mea-
sures should be known as early as possible, since adding a new sustainability
characteristic to the building in the middle of the design could be very costly. As an
example, energy consumption monitoring for different energy users in the building
is always a very good sustainability measures to have in the building specifi cally in
order to monitor the real energy consumption of the building sections after the
building is occupied by different tenants. From the point of view of an electrical
engineer wiring the electrical power in the building should be designed in a specifi c
manner to comply with this requirement. If from day one the owner and the team
agree upon achieving this desirable measure, the cost of the design and construction
would not be affected considerably. But if the building power wiring is designed or
even worse is installed without expectation of achieving this measure, and some-
times down the road a decision is made to add this function to the building sustain-
ability system, then the cost of design or constructing the change into the under
construction building would be dramatically higher.
As I have mentioned earlier in a successful integrated design all parties including
the owner, the design team, the construction team and the commissioning team
should be actively involved in all stages of the project. Different stages of a project
delivery are usually referred to as conceptualization stage, design development
stage, design stage, construction stage, and post-occupancy stage.
Conceptualization stage is the earliest stage that the design and construction
team meet the owner and get familiar with his expectations of the building and also
the project budget. There are many examples of the building designs that were
started with a very high level of energy saving factors conceptualized in the early
stages of the project implementation, just to be removed from the scope of the proj-
ect due to lack of harmony between the design team imagination and the owner's
budget. The design and construction team should in detail study the level of sustain-
ability and energy saving that the owner desires to include into his building. Design
team then should propose the possible systems, designs, material availability, and
more important the cost associated with these factors to make sure that enough
budget is available for designing and implementing these measures.
