Consulting-Specifying Engineer - June 2008 - (Page 52)

nately, project teams unfamiliar with the fundamental purposes and interaction of these documents frequently find them burdensome, expensive, and of little value. As a result, the OPR, BOD, and SM are widely misunderstood and underused. Some of the confusion regarding the OPR, BOD, and SM results from the terms being used inconsistently by different organizations and publications. For the purposes of this discussion, the following definitions will be used: • OPR: Documents the owner’s functional requirements and the criteria the owner will use to determine whether these requirements have been fulfilled. Past ASHRAE and LEED publications used the title “Owner’s Design Intent Document.” • BOD: Documents the concepts on which When the commissioning professional introduces the OPR, BOD, and SM to the project team, the reactions vary depending on the experiences team members have had with these documents. Teams that haven’t used the documents or have had bad experiences often push back. Typical and logical questions are: “That sounds like more work—who’s going to do it?”, “How are we going to find the time to do it?”, and “Who’s going to pay for it?” Teams with this experience welcome the OPR, BOD, and SM as key documents that facilitate successful project design, construction, and commissioning; cost-effective tools that improve project efficiency; and documentation of the systems’ functionality that provides value for operators and facility managers throughout the building’s life. In order to optimize the chance for successful commissioning, project teams new to the OPR, BOD, and SM must answer the following question: “How can we use the OPR, BOD, and SM documents as cost-effective tools for our projects?” Understanding the OPR, BOD, and SM To fully understand the OPR, BOD, and SM documents, it helps to understand what these documents have in common and how they build on one another. One of the most important things for project teams to understand is that all three docu- Editor’s note This article is derived from a paper presented by the author at the 16th National Conference on Building Commissioning (NCBC), April 21–24. NCBC is owned and managed by PECI. For the original paper and others, visit www.peci .org/ncbc. Consulting-Specifying Engineer is the media sponsor for NCBC. Project teams unfamiliar with the fundamental purposes of the OPR, BOD, and SM often find them burdensome, expensive, and useless. systems are based, the methodology used to approach the design, and how the design satisfies the OPR. It is not uncommon for the BOD to be called the “AE” or “Engineer’s Design Intent Document.” • SM: Documents information to help understand and operate the systems as the owner and designers intended for them to operate. This systems-oriented document goes beyond equipment oriented operating and maintenance manuals. ments consist of work provided primarily by parties other than the commissioning authority (CxA) and are best developed by the team collaboratively. The previously sited LEED requirements underscore this. LEED for New Construction Version 2.2 requires the following regarding the OPR and BOD: “The owner shall document the OPR. The design team shall develop the BOD. The CxA shall review these documents for clarity and completeness. The 52 Consulting-Specifying Engineer • JUNE 2008 http://www.peci.org/ncbc http://www.peci.org/ncbc http://www.peci.org/ncbc

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Consulting-Specifying Engineer - June 2008

Consulting-Specifying Engineer - June 2008 Contents Viewpoint Letters News M/E Roundtable No Gambling Allowed on Smoke Control in Las Vegas Be Prepared: Hospital Protections for Catastrophic Events Ready for Retail Commissioning Documents: Necessary Evil Codes & Standards Codes & Standards Case Study Equipment Lifecycles New Products Advertiser Index Green Space

Consulting-Specifying Engineer - June 2008

For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.