Commissioning is a quality control process that ensures a building is designed, built, and operated according to the owner’s requirements. In most cases, the owner directly hires a commissioning provider. Commissioned systems typically include mechanical (HVAC), electrical, and plumbing. Commissioning is required by some state energy codes, and it is also a central part of green building certifications, such as LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design).

Examples of faults include the following:

Controls

• Undesired operator overrides

• Undesired occupant overrides

• Undesired scheduling

• Improperly programmed control sequences

• Unstable process control

Sensors

• Drift

• Failure

Devices

• Actuator slippage or failure

• Valve or damper malfunction

• Equipment short-cycling

In its fullest form, new construction commissioning (NCCx) for a building begins at conception and design and extends through construction and into the first year of occupancy.

Below are typical NCCx activities.

Pre-Construction

• Owners Project Requirements (OPR). Assist the owner in drafting the OPR, which includes requirements such as building functional needs, building performance goals, and maintenance requirements, among others.

• Basis of Design (BOD). Review and comment on the BOD developed by the building designers to confirm alignment with the OPR. This document includes descriptions and preliminary calculations for the proposed building systems, such as HVAC, electrical, plumbing, building envelope, and fire protection, among others.

• Design. Review and comment on the building design drawings to confirm alignment with the BOD and OPR, as well as provide additional quality control on behalf of the owner.

• Submittals. Review and comment on the equipment proposed by contractors for installation to confirm that it will meet the building design intent.

Construction

• Pre-Functional Checks. Physically inspect that the equipment is installed in accordance with the design specifications and manufacturer requirements.

• Functional Performance Testing. Draft test scripts, witness contractor testing, and perform sensor calibration checks. These tests typically include confirmation of proper startup, shutdown, fault response, alarm generation, and normal operation.

• Issue Resolution & Reporting. Perform backchecks to ensure that contractors have resolved identified issues and re-test systems as needed.

• Training & Documentation. Ensure that contractors provide videotaped training and system documentation to the owner’s facility staff.

Post-Construction

• Post-Occupancy Trends. During the first year of occupancy, review available time series data from the building automation system (i.e., “trend data”) to confirm proper building operation and work with contractors to resolve operational deficiencies.

Relative to our competitors, we are different in the following ways:

• Algorithms configured to your actual control sequences. We do not infer sequences of operation based on available points or only look for deviations from baseline behavior. We configure our algorithms to how your equipment is programmed and physically arranged. If your sequences of operation are unknown, we perform sequence detection.

• Onboarding that identifies controls improvement opportunities. During onboarding, we review your building’s existing control sequences and recommend low-cost and no-cost improvements. This is the equivalent of a controls-based retro-commissioning investigation.

• Ability to confirm proper sequences of operation. We can confirm proper control and identify programming errors for simple and complex control sequences. This is an automated commissioning activity that goes beyond traditional fault detection and diagnostics.

Retro-commissioning (RCx) is a one-time project to identify operational issues and opportunities at an existing building. It is also known as existing building commissioning (EBCx).

The scope of RCx varies based on building and budget, and the intent is generally to lower utility bills and resolve persistent occupant comfort issues. Below is a list of typical activities for a higher-effort RCx project.

• Identify owner objectives

• Gather as-built drawings, utility bills, and building automation system trend data

• Physically inspect systems and interview operating personnel

• Analyze historical trend data

• Perform functional performance tests on select equipment

• Perform calibration checks on select sensors

• Develop a summary report of operational issues and tuning opportunities with ROI analysis

• Measure and verify the energy impact of implemented projects

An increasing number of municipalities in the United States now mandate RCx to help achieve sustainability goals.

In commissioning, building performance typically considers the following:

• Energy Use. Overall building energy performance is often tracked with a metric called energy use intensity (EUI) which is the total annual energy use divided by gross floor area in units of kBtu/ft2/yr. Energy performance index (EPI) is the same concept expressed in units of kWh/m2/yr.

• Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ). IEQ can include ventilation rates, levels of indoor pollutants, moisture control, thermal comfort, visual comfort, and acoustic comfort. In monitoring-based commissioning, many buildings track outside air ventilation rates and zone environmental index, which combines zone temperature, humidity, and CO2, to the extent that those sensors are available, into a single metric.

• Equipment Life. Premature equipment failures generally indicate deferred maintenance, and prolonging equipment life through calibrated preventative maintenance is an excellent way to control long-term operating costs. An example of calibrating preventative maintenance would be “rodding out” a chiller condenser at optimal intervals as determined by analysis of building automation system trend data.

• Utility & Maintenance Costs. According to 2018 BOMA data, utilities and maintenance on average represent 24% of office building operating expenses. Tracking and managing these expenses is an important lever for maintaining and improving building net operating income.

Unlike traditional commissioning, monitoring-based commissioning (MBCx) is an ongoing program that leverages data to enable superior operations and maintenance. It can last several months or extend to the total life of the building, and it is sometimes called continuous commissioning (CCx) or ongoing commissioning (OCx).

Benefits. Our service includes the option of monthly or quarterly check-ins with our engineers and has the following benefits:

• Maintenance staff save significant time and cover more ground.

• During onboarding, controls improvement opportunities are identified, similar to what would be done in retro-commissioning.

• Operational issues are detected, prioritized, and tracked.

• Energy savings are measured and verified.

• Preventative maintenance can be streamlined, where sensors, filters, and heat exchangers are physically checked and maintained on an as-needed basis.

• Building key performance indicators are tracked.

• Periodic summary reports are provided for middle management—e.g., monthly or quarterly.

• Annual summary reports are provided for higher management.

Data & Analytics. MBCx typically includes the following:

• Building automation system data

• Building meter data

• Fault detection and diagnostics

• Meter analytics

Much of functional testing can be shifted to post-occupancy tuning while the building is still under warranty, resulting in cheaper commissioning and a better building.

Traditional functional tests are labor intensive and prone to human error. During construction, the building also lacks real loads, and testing sample sizes are budget constrained. With standard commissioning, HVAC systems typically still have many lingering hardware and controls issues at turnover to the owner.

For scope unrelated to normal operation—such as confirmation of proper startup, shutdown, fault response, and alarm generation—we still recommend traditional functional testing during construction. For normal operation, however, we recommend implementing rigorous fault detection and diagnostics (FDD) during the first year of occupancy. This is to confirm proper operation during all seasons and identify issues such as the following:

• Hardware faults

• Improper sequences

• Excessive device cycling

• Inability to meet setpoint

• Mis-mapped BAS points

This approach saves time, captures true occupied operation, and delivers a higher quality building.