Water – the new carbon

A large number of Members and guests joined us at our Annual Meeting and Presidential Lecture in May. They gathered to recognise the achievements of our latest medalists, to thank our outgoing President, John Armstrong, for his service, and to welcome our new President, Professor John Swaffield, and hear his Presidential Address: Living with the Albatross.

It will surprise nobody that a major theme of the Address was the need to apply CIBSE’s skills of providing design guidance and knowledge dissemination to address the water based causes and effects of climate change. John argued that water based issues should increasingly become an integral part of CIBSE’s response to the challenge of climate change, with associated guidance to support this.

It is very timely that we have in our new President a worldwide reputation in fluid mechanics and water engineering. This year sees the launch of a consultation on changes to Part G of the Building Regulations, dealing with water supply. It also co-incides with the launch of the government’s Water Strategy, in March. And it also occurs when CIBSE is producing a range of new guidance on the theme of water, to address some of the current water supply and public health issues relating to water.

It is particularly appropriate that at this time of growing interest in water we have a President with an interest in this area, to support and champion the work of the Society of Public Health Engineers (SOPHE). The CIBSE Societies provide a ready means for the Institution to deliver expertise and specialist knowledge to engage in areas of importance to the wider profession, whilst drawing on the wider awareness and influence which CIBSE enjoys within the engineering and construction communities, and with government. In this way, the impact of the Institution as a whole is certainly greater than the sum of the constituent parts, adding value and enhancing effectiveness for the Societies and specialist groupings within the Institutional family.

The Address also emphasised the role of CIBSE as a Learned Society, and called for us to continue to engage with the Research Councils and research community, to grow the links with EPSRC in particular, and to further engage with the new managed programmes emerging from EPSRC and the other Research Councils. Increasingly, EPSRC and others view CIBSE as a key intermediate between the academic and industrial communities. CIBSE has already taken a key role in relation to the development of climate data to enable professionals to design for the future, and not in the past. The new Adaptation and Resilience for a Changing Climate programme, currently being developed by EPSRC and the research community, will broaden the scope for CIBSE to operate in an intermediary role in this area.

John referred to Coleridge’s Ancient Mariner, so now we know why he has a beard perhaps? In any event the immortal line of “water, water, everywhere and not a drop to drink” does not apply to CIBSE, there is much to do as we seek to address these issues and to embrace the challenge of representing our members and the wider community in seeking solutions to these crucial problems that face society. We need to ensure we have a “broad kirk” so that we can provide an organisation that embraces the many strands of the built environment. The challenge and issues are all interweaved into a complex pattern; it really does need the finest engineers to unravel and explain. As I speak we are building the foundations for the albatrosses!

I look forward to working with John as President over the coming year, and I know that the staff will join me in wishing him every success, and in doing all we can to support him during his time in office.

Stephen Matthews
CIBSE Chief Executive

CIBSE President Elect John Swaffield Theme for 2008

One of CIBSE’s strengths is the diversity of its membership and this is reflected on our Board, our Consultative Council, our groups and societies and the spread of our members internationally. It is also reflected in the themes for our Presidential years.

I have recently returned from a trip to Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Dubai accompanying our President Elect John Swaffield. John’s Presidential Theme will be water and spending time with John, hearing him speak to so many of our International members was time well spent.

We all look forward to focussing on water and public health – such vital issues for building services during John’s presidential year.

Recent Presidential themes have been sustainability and the nature of the construction industry. Sustainability along with related themes such as energy efficiency has been challenging enough but with the public embracing the challenge of climate change and governments concerned with security of energy for the future we have been pushing at an open door.

The leadership of our Presidents has catalysed many publications and events and the development of the Low Carbon Consultants Scheme and the 100 days of Carbon Clean-Up campaign. More recently our current President John Armstrong has focussed on whole life costing and building operation and this has enabled CIBSE to demonstrate that we are about all buildings, not just new build. This is vital if we are to address the energy wastage caused by existing buildings.

A very challenging issue is the improvement of the construction industry which, it seems, needs to be addressed right at its core. Like many other countries the construction industry in the UK is based on historical practices and processes. We have been aware of the need to change for a long time and various attempts have been made.

CIBSE’s membership base covers the breadth of the building services industry – specialists in specific services but also manufacturers, installers, supply chain managers, project managers, facilities managers as well as consultant designers. This is another great strength which allows CIBSE to take a broad perspective and identify the areas in the whole supply chain and procurement process that are weak.

At the end of 2007 CIBSE responded to the UK Government’s Strategy for Sustainable Construction and we stressed the need to change the industry for better and for ever.

2008 heralds a number of exciting initiatives for CIBSE. Hot on the tail of achieving our UKAS accreditation for CIBSE Certification we are now expanding the Low Carbon Consultant scheme to provide the basis of accreditation for energy assessors. We have also developed a flexible learning scheme.

As part of CIBSE’s obligation to the public good we have been looking at how we can provide training to services engineers after graduation, to help build on their degree training and fill in the gaps in their practical knowledge to enable them to develop as engineers. We will provide this through on-line and other electronic forms such as ‘i-seminars’ and web casts.

We believe that flexible learning will enable busy young engineers who may not have the time to attend seminars or go back to college to keep up to date in our rapidly developing industry.

Learning in a practical work environment seems to me to be essential if CIBSE members are to provide excellence in building services. Flexible learning, with its electronic delivery is well suited to our busy global CIBSE community.

I would like to take this opportunity to wish all CIBSE members and readers of the BSJ a happy and prosperous 2008.

Stephen Matthews
Chief Executive