This is the how-to guide for continuously evaluating and improving the performance of commercial buildings throughout their service life. It is also intended to support integrated commissioning and all activities of the building's O&M team. It is the book that facility managers, building operators, technicians, consultants, commissioning authorities, architects, and design engineers need to ensure that their buildings are green, energy efficient, highly productive, healthy, and attractive to others. This Guide gives building owners and their consultants the practical performance measurement guidance to meet market demands for keeping operating costs down without sacrificing the health, comfort, and productivity of their highest cost component - the building's occupants. This book provides specific best practices in the areas of energy use, water use, and four elements of indoor environmental quality (IEQ): thermal comfort, indoor air quality (IAQ), lighting/ daylighting, and acoustics. Using this guidance, owners can be proactive on an ongoing basis to reduce costs through measurement and verification of their buildings' environments.
This book is a follow-on publication to ASHRAE's Performance Measurement Protocols for Commercial Buildings, which describes what to measure, how it is to be measured, and how often it is to be measured to quantitatively assess the performance of commercial buildings. This Guide provides the process and tools for performance evaluation and improvement and is user friendly, phased, and readily applicable, with step-by-step procedures provided at three levels of application: Basic Evaluation, which uses observations of building characteristics, perceptions of occupants, and data from utility bills to characterize performance. Diagnostic Measurement, which uses physical measurements to diagnose problems indicated at the Basic Evaluation Level and to identify how performance can be improved. Advanced Analysis, which uses the results of the first two levels plus the results of professional investigative processes to identify specific actions for performance improvement. This Guide also includes Workbooks and Resources supplemental files (included as a CD with the print edition and in the zip file of the pdf download) that contains a report template in Microsoft Word format and standardized forms, worksheets, and checklists in Microsoft® Excel® format to simplify, facilitate, and expedite the process. The Workbooks and Resources CD is optimized for Windows and is single-user only.