What Is An Intelligent Building? Part 2: Intelligent Building Construction and Operation

摘要

In the first half of this series, we looked at the definition of an intelligent building and what was necessary in the design process to ensure that the intelligent attributes were incorporated. This article looks at what is involved in the crucial phases of construction and operation of an intelligent building. Once an intelligent building is designed, the first challenge is to make sure that the team remains committed to keeping it intelligent throughout construction. There are a lot of discussions about the best way to contract for an intelligent building. The traditional model is to hire an architect who, in turn, builds a team with an MEP consultant and they, in turn, create project documents. General contractors are then asked to bid on the construction documents and assemble a project price using their team of subcontractors. Unfortunately during this process, the desire to make a building intelligent is often lost in the confusion of keeping the project within the allocated budget. Often, we try to bring projects within budget through a process called value engineering, implying that we are enhancing the value of a project. In reality, this process often removes areas of high value in a desperate attempt to keep the project under budget. It is important that the design and construction team agrees early on as to the importance and priority of the intelligent attributes and works to keep them in scope, even when project budgets become a challenge.