Editorial

Citation

Finch, E. (1999), "Editorial", Facilities, Vol. 17 No. 11. https://doi.org/10.1108/f.1999.06917kaa.001

Editorial

This single issue of Facilities begins with a very topical subject - embodied energy. Many facilities managers feel confused about the environmental impact of purchasing decisions. What does it mean to be an environmentally friendly facilities manager? Facilities managers need to be singing from the same "song-sheet" as the rest of the organisation. An organisation promoting itself as environmentally friendly needs to demonstrate this not only in its products but also in the infrastructure used to produce a product or service. The selection of sustainable products and low energy products is a key consideration for building operators. This should permeate through to out-sourced services, where the choice of cleaning method or replacement strategy should reflect environmental concerns. The paper by Treloar, McCoubrie, Love and Iyer-Raniga provides some insightful information on the question of embodied energy in fixtures and fittings. The highly significant conclusion from this paper is that "embodied in furniture, fixtures and fit out was found to be one of the most important elements of the life cycle of a building, in energy terms".

The paper by Ornstein, Leite and de Andrade from Brazil, provides insight into methodological issues surrounding post-occupancy evaluation. One area identified as being of particular concern is that of personal security. Their recommendation is that "... the issue of personal security in buildings should be broadened, given the importance of this aspect for the user of buildings of this nature and the close relation between security and architecture".

The paper by Nima, Abdul-Kadir and Jaafar argues for the early involvement of construction site engineers to improve constructability. They contend that "improving constructability will decrease the likelihood of delays, contract change orders due to unforeseen site conditions, and legal entanglement and claims". This argument has interesting parallels with that of the facilities management fraternity that has also sought greater involvement at the design stage. The argument for standardisation of building components is relevant to constructability and building maintenance. Nima et al. suggest that "building systems, material types, construction details, dimensions, and elevations may all be standardised for increasing field efficiency and enhanced constructability". It will be interesting to see how the argument over standardisation or "modularisation" develops in years to come.

Edward FinchDepartment of Construction Management and Engineering,The University of Reading, UK