I have been commissioning building systems for 30 years, and that is starting to feel like a very long time. One of the startling manifestations of that passage of time is the fact that buildings I commissioned back then are now being demolished or completely gutted and retrofitted. The topic of this month’s column, though, is about something less predictable that I’ve begun to notice recently.
For the most commissioning-committed building owners, e.g., higher education, government, health care, there is a new generation of owner representatives and project managers who have never been through a major design and/or construction project without commissioning. This distinction hadn’t been obvious while their senior mentors were running the show, but now those senior project managers are retiring, and some building owners only have the new generation.