February 28, 2008

Canadian Standards Association ready to draft national building commissioning standards

Association will collaborate with owners, consulting engineering and contracting communities

PATRICIA WILLIAMS

staff writer

With funding now in place, work is expected to get under way shortly on development of a national standard for commissioning of buildings in Canada.

Richard McKeagan, president of the Mechanical Contractors Association of Canada (MCAC) said the required $125,000 has been raised to underwrite the first phase of the three-step process.

“We’ve secured that, with the assistance of stakeholder groups,” said McKeagan, whose organization spearheaded establishment of a task force late in 2005 to create a single, recognized national commissioning standard. “We expect to see the development process get under way within the next few weeks.”

Currently, commissioning is carried out through a variety of processes. The standard will be drafted by the Canadian Standards Association (CSA) in collaboration with key stakeholders — among them owners and the consulting engineering and contracting communities.

The first phase, the standard development component, is expected to take 12 to 18 months to complete.

“This is a short time-frame,” McKeagan said. “The reason it can be expedited is that we have a template to work with — an existing CSA standard for commissioning of healthcare facilities.”

Subsequent phases involve development of an electronic version of the standard with practical application tools as well as certification and training programs.

CSA now is in the process of organizing and implementing the five steps to create what will be known as CSA Z320.

Those are: Identifying subject matter experts; establishing technical committees and subcommittees; developing and publishing a “consensus” standard; drafting a “seed” document and maintaining the standard over the long term.

Funding is being provided in part by MCAC and its provincial affiliates, the Canadian Construction Association and two federal government agencies, Defence Construction Canada and Public Works and Government Services Canada.

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