Introduction
Principles and procedures of Total Building Commissioning (Cx) are presented as a case study of the U.S. District Courthouse, which is
being constructed in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, as a design-bid-build project. This 10-story building has a floor area of
approximately 357,000 gross square feet and has an estimated construction cost
of $177 million. The construction is to be completed in July 2014. Setty performed total building
commissioning to Commissioning (C x) to evaluate the integrated performance of building
systems.
The new courthouse was designed in accordance with the PBS Facilities Standards P100-2005 and the 2007 U.S. Court Design Guide. It has also been designed to achieve “gold certification” in accordance with Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED®), which, through its requirement for commissioning, is intended to verify that the building has been designed and built using strategies aimed at improving overall performance compared to a baseline design.
This case study focuses
on commissioning of
several systems during
the design phase,
and partial commissioning of the envelope system, which was the only
system available for performance testing
during the early
stage of construction. Findings and conclusions are
presented regarding performance enhancements of several systems attributable to
commissioning during the design phase, and performance testing of the envelope
system during the early construction stage.
Conclusions
1) Successful Total
Building Commissioning (C x ) is highly dependent on the clarity and timeliness
of the criteria and procedures that are defined in the Owner’s Project
Requirements (OPR). The 10-year gap from
start of initial
design to start
of construction was an
impediment to the C x process in this
case study.
2) C x is more than a
design process. Commissioning of the
physical systems to pre-set criteria at the onset and duration of construction is
critical to successful building performance.
