CIBSE launched a new edition of Guide M: Maintenance engineering and management on 19 November at an event held at the Royal Academy of Engineering. The Guide brings together everything designers and facilities managers need to know about maintaining and operating buildings in one authoritative publication.

The Guide identifies current good practice and is relevant to designers, manufacturers, installers, maintainers, building owners, occupiers and operators, professional advisors and specialist providers.

This new edition is intended to bring maintenance into sharper focus by helping facilities managers to deliver effective workplaces and discharge statutory duties. It will also help services designers to appreciate their role in providing installations that are safe, economic to maintain and operate, and capable of giving satisfactory performance over their full lifespan.

CIBSE president elect, Nick Mead, said: “CIBSE’s Guide M is essential reading for everyone involved in designing, installing or operating building services. It is a comprehensive guide to good practice in the operation and maintenance of buildings.”

Pressures on the supply, security and cost of energy are putting greater pressure on the FM industry to deliver energy efficiency. Current UK legislative requirements, such as the Carbon Reduction Commitment Energy Efficiency Scheme and the Energy Savings Opportunity Scheme (ESOS) are aimed at maximising the benefits and minimising the downsides of the energy impacts of a business. Guide M emphasises that maintainers have an integral part to play in managing energy and there is a chapter dedicated to energy efficiency as well as a chapter on building controls.

The Guide was produced in collaboration with the Building Services Research and Information Association (BSRIA), the Building and Engineering Services Association (B&ES) and the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) to allow a common data structure for the presentation of asset information. Economic life data provided in the Guide is structured by system and elements, numbered to match RICS’s New Rules of Measurement 3 and providing maintenance task references corresponding to B&ES’s SFG20.

Other chapters in the guide include design considerations with regards to health and comfort, maintenance, commissioning, handover and operation and maintenance (O&M) manuals including current BIM (building information modelling) guidance. On the operational side there are chapters dedicated to maintenance strategy, business risk assessments, maintenance contracts, condition surveys, maintenance audits, training and competency.

Printed or electronic copies of Guide M are available for purchase from www.cibse.org/knowledge, with electronic copies downloadable for free to CIBSE members.