In the article “Smart buildings: What 'smart' really means”, Lecomte (2019) states that having certification with standardized rubrics is fundamental for smart buildings to wholly emerge in the “built environment”. Lecomte mentions that the lack of unanimity from various stakeholders has delayed the drafting of standardized rubrics. Hence, private and public sectors design their own rubrics to assess smart buildings but their rubrics vary from one another. However, current private and public rubrics have been unsuccessful in tackling the complicated and expanding aspect that buildings will perform in “smart cities”. Lecomte emphasizes that one crucial component to be included in the standardized rubrics would be cyber risk management as cyber threats “increase exponentially” along with more advanced and integrated technology in smart buildings. Lecomte concludes that holistic and reliable “smart building certifications and rubrics” will be the foundation of a “functioning market for smart real estate”.
While Lecomte stated his case for establishing smart building certification under standardized rubrics and discussed inconsistencies in current indicators, he did not suggest concrete proposals to fully address the challenges.
First of all, Lecomte mentioned the need for “common standards and metrics” in smart building certifications, given their importance in smart cities. He also cited the success of globally recognised green building certification, LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification. Such standardized certification system will offer a clear method for smart buildings to be benchmarked against consistent rubrics, and allow for the identification of improvement opportunities. This view is shared by Smeenk (2018) who stated in an article that recognized “industry-wide smart building certification levels” will “become the basis” for leaders to understand and develop smart cities. In addition, LEED has been thought to be critical in “transforming building practices” for the last 25 years by the U.S. Green Building Council (Long, 2018), and this emphasises the value for such a standardized certification system. Thus, like the use of LEED certification for green buildings, standardizing the metrics and rubrics for smart building certification has the potential to positively impact the built environment and accelerate the progress towards smart cities.
In addition to making the case for smart building certifications with standardized metrics and rubrics, Lecomte also highlighted the inconsistencies in smart building indicators used by different countries and corporations, which hampered the development of a standardized smart building certification. As different countries and corporations have unique priorities, it can be a huge challenge for them to negotiate the differences and come to an agreement on what a smart building really is. In a research paper published by the Czech Technical University (Lom & Pribyl, 2017), it was acknowledged that there are no straightforward and comprehensible framework which will allow cities to assess the benefits of their smart city solutions. Sullivan (2018) also suggested that varying definitions of smart buildings as well as the lack of wide-spread acceptance of existing indicators are key obstacles to the development of a standardized building certification programme. It appears to be a rather collective view that the road towards smart building certification with standardized metrics and rubrics will need considerable effort.
Lastly, although Lecomte listed the importance for consistent smart building rubrics and metrics, he did not make specific proposals on how to drive efforts to introduce a “universal framework”. For instance, a possible course of action is the recent push to develop and “launch the world’s first Intelligent Buildings Index” (Willow, 2019). This effort is being led by International Intelligent Buildings Organisation and will use “a state-of-the-art literature review, international stakeholder engagement and calibration against a global spectrum of smart buildings” (Willow, 2019). The index also promises to “ensure that the index stays abreast of latest industry and technological advances” (Willow, 2019). The process of developing this index can potentially deal with the inconsistencies that Lecomte mentioned in his article and help unify views of diverse stakeholders.
In conclusion, Lecomte’s article mentioned the importance of having a standardized smart building certification in the development of smart cities and listed key contributors hindering its development. However, he did not fully address how a “universal framework” can be developed. As the advancement of smart cities require significant time and effort for stakeholders to come together to standardize on a common metrics and rubrics for smart buildings, there is no better time than now to utilise a well-defined approach to progress towards the creation of a universal definition of smart cities.
References:
Lecomte, P. (2019, January 29). Smart buildings: What 'smart' really means. The Business Times. Retrieved from: https://www.businesstimes.com.sg/opinion/smart-buildings-what-smart-really-means
Lom, M., & Pribyl, O. (2017). Smаrt City Evaluation Framework (SMACEF): Is a smart city solution beneficial for your city? Systemics, Cybernetics and Informatics, 15(3), 60-65.
Long, M. (2018). Green building accelerates around the world, poised for strong growth by 2021. U.S. Green Building Council. Retrieved from: https://www.usgbc.org/articles/green-building-accelerates-around-world-poised-strong-growth-2021
Smeenk, H. G. (2018, March 12). The smart way to smart cities begins with buildings. Smart Buildings Magazine. Retrieved from: http://www.smartbuildingsmagazine.com/features/the-smart-way-to-smart-cities-begins-with-buildings
Sullivan, E. (2018). Is a smart building certification on the way?. Facilitiesnet. Retrieved from: https://www.facilitiesnet.com/buildingautomation/article/Is-A-Smart-Building-Certification-On-The-Way---17485
Willow. (2019). Introducing the world’s first Intelligent Buildings Index. Retrieved from: https://www.willowinc.com/2019/06/11/introducing-the-worlds-first-intelligent-buildings-index/
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