ISO 15686 Buildings and Constructed Assets - Service Life Planning

The “ISO 15686 Buildings and constructed assets - Service life planning” standard published by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) consists of the following subsections published under the same title:

• ISO 15686-1 Part 1: General principles and framework establishes general principles for service life planning and a systematic framework for undertaking service life planning throughout the life cycle of a planned building or construction work (or the remaining life cycle for existing buildings or construction works). The life cycle includes initiation, project definition, design, construction, commissioning, operation, maintenance, renovation, replacement, dismantling, and the eventual disposal, recycling, or reuse of the asset (or parts thereof), including its components, systems, and building services. This standard is applicable to the service life planning of individual buildings.
• ISO 15686-2 Part 2: Service Life Estimation Procedures describes procedures that facilitate service life estimations of building components based on technical and functional performance. It provides a general framework, principles, and requirements for conducting and reporting such studies. This standard does not address limitations on service life due to obsolescence or other unmeasurable or unpredictable performance conditions.

The methodology described is intended to be general and facilitate the prediction of the service life of any type of building component for use in a given or a range of in-service environments, for a given or appropriate set of performance requirements. In practice, a service life prediction is often limited to covering a few typical service environments or a single reference environment complemented by an analysis of the sensitivity of degradation agents to concentration changes. In this work, the term prediction refers to one or any combination of the following ways of assessing service life:

• Acceleration of the time dimension (in accelerated short-term exposures)
• Interpolation/extrapolation using data from similar components
• Interpolation/extrapolation using data from similar service environments
• Extrapolation in time (short-term in-use exposures)

• The standard "ISO 15686-4 Part 4: Service life planning using building information modeling" provides information and guidance on the use of information exchange standards and the necessary supporting data for the service life planning of buildings and constructed assets and their components. It provides guidance on structuring information from existing data sources to ensure that the information content is communicated in a structure that complies with international information exchange standards. Specifically, reference is made to ISO 16739.

This standard can be used for the following purposes:

• Achieving and maintaining a common understanding across national and project contexts
• Determine desired results and define appropriate quality
• Determine appropriate management effort and tools
• Determining the effort and resources required

Service life planning involves applying data about elements in a building or constructed asset to determine and communicate their design, projected, or estimated service life. Buildings are increasingly being designed using building information modeling, an approach that can provide a specification of all objects within a building and how they are integrated into parts, assemblies, and systems. An architect or engineer can describe objects using building information modeling.

• The standard "ISO 15686-5 Part 5: Life-cycle costing" describes requirements and guidelines for conducting life-cycle cost analyses of buildings and constructed assets and their components, whether new or existing. Life-cycle costing takes into account the costs or cash flows incurred from acquisition through operation and disposal—that is, the associated costs (and revenue and externalities, if included within the agreed scope). Life-cycle costing typically involves comparing alternatives or estimating future costs at the portfolio, project, or component level. Life-cycle costing is performed over an agreed analysis period, clearly defining whether the analysis covers only a portion of the constructed asset or the entire life cycle.

The goal of life-cycle costing should be to quantify life-cycle costs as an input to a decision-making or evaluation process and should typically include input from other assessments (e.g., environmental assessment, design assessment, safety assessment, functionality assessment, and regulatory compliance assessment). Quantification should be at the level of detail required for key project phases. The scope of costs included or excluded from a life-cycle costing analysis should be defined and agreed upon with the client at the outset.

• ISO 15686-6 Part 6: Procedures for Considering Environmental Impacts describes how to assess the potential environmental impacts of alternative designs for a constructed asset during the design phase. This standard defines the interface between environmental life cycle assessment and service life planning. Other performance criteria are referenced to explain the context of this standard, but they are not defined within its scope.

The environmental impacts associated with built assets can be significant and should generally be addressed in project planning. Every product has an impact on the environment. These impacts can occur at any or all stages of the product's life cycle and can be local, regional, or global, or a combination of the three. Improvements in one area of ​​concern may lead to decreased performance in another area. This standard does not provide any recommendations regarding the balance between environmental and other aspects.

• ISO 15686-7 Part 7: Performance assessment for feedback of service life data from applications provides a general basis for performance assessment for feedback of service life data from existing buildings and constructed assets. This includes a definition of the terms to be used and a description of how (technical) performance can be described and documented to ensure consistency. The purpose of this standard is to describe the principles for service life performance surveys and assessment, with an emphasis on technical recommendations. It describes a general methodology, including the terms to be used, that provides guidance on the planning, documentation, and review phases, as well as the analysis and interpretation of performance assessments at the object (individual building) and network (building stock) levels. While maintenance planning is beyond the scope of this standard, maintenance-focused surveys and subsequent recommended actions can have significant impacts on service life and performance.
• ISO 15686-8 Part 8: Reference service life and service life estimation provides guidance on providing, selecting, and formatting reference service life data and applying this data to calculate the estimated service life using the factor method. However, this standard does not provide guidance on how to estimate the values ​​of the modification part or factors A to G using given reference use conditions and object-specific use conditions.
• ISO 15686-9 Part 9: Guidance on the Evaluation of Service Life Data provides a technical specification and guidance for the derivation and presentation of reference service life data. This standard applies to manufacturers or fabricators who provide reference service life data for use in service life planning in accordance with other parts. Throughout this standard, unless the context indicates otherwise, the term "building" means a building or other civil work or constructed asset. Furthermore, unless otherwise specified, the term "component" means a material, product, component, assembly, or system.

The service life estimate for an entire building should be derived from the service life estimates of all relevant components that comprise the building. Estimates should be based on a reference service life, as detailed in the relevant sections. The estimated service life should take into account aspects that will affect the performance and deterioration of components throughout their service life, thereby altering the reference service life. These include: the component's inherent performance, the design level of the works, standards of workmanship (or level of work execution), the interior environment, the exterior environment, conditions of use, and the level of maintenance.

• ISO 15686-10 Part 10: When to Assess Functional Performance describes when to determine or verify the functional performance requirements of buildings and their associated facilities throughout their service life, and when to verify the ability of buildings and facilities to meet these requirements. This standard is applicable to any inventory, whether a set or portfolio of buildings, a single building (large or small), or a facility within a building (such as a group of spaces, a single floor, or several floors). It is applicable to a range of stakeholder roles, from owners and managers to occupiers, tenants, or other users. The other sections of this standard are intended for use in conjunction with ISO 15686-9.

The stages and phases of a building's life cycle are illustrated in the figures and tables provided within the standard. There is no single international standard for the stages and phases of a building's or building-related facility's life cycle or its entire life cycle.

• “ISO 15686-11 The standard “Part 11: Terminology” provides a compilation of standardized concept terms and definitions to create a glossary applicable to aspects of both the construction and use of a building or civil engineering works and the service life planning of the same building.

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