EVENT | CIBSE UAE CONFERENCE PLOTTING UAES HEALTHY RECOVERY The challenge of designing green and healthy buildings in a time of a pandemic was the theme of the CIBSE UAE regions first virtual conference held in August. Nizam Ahmed picks out the highlights T he CIBSE UAE chair Farah Naz opened the event by considering what the role of the building services engineer might be in a post-pandemic world focused on a green recovery. Architect Andrew Shaw, chair of the RIBA Gulf Chapter, looked at how design connected to nature would make buildings more liveable and offer psychological benefits to occupants. As well as being greener, he predicted an increase in prefabrication, increased digitisation and green travel. Prospera CEO Gurjit Singh spoke about how the pandemic had accelerated the need to ingrain resilience into the built environment across the building lifetime. While the pandemic had decreased human mobility, he said, it had accelerated the use of data and information. Building owners would have to come up with new strategies to make use of buildings with lower footfall such as hotels, said Singh. He also drew attention to the Institute of Place Managements recovery framework, which in the context of Covid-19 offers a model to support places through crisis, pre-recovery, recovery and transformation.1 The Well Health and Safety Rating 2 developed by International Well Building Institute (IWBI) was introduced by Mona Holtktter, a manager at the International Well Building Institute and Immediate Past Chair CIBSE Ireland. The rating has a subset of features from the Well Building Standard that have been adapted for facilities management. It was conceived to not only help users prepare for the safe reoccupation of spaces post Covid-19, but to support the long-term health and safety needs of people in buildings. Imran Shaikh, CIBSE UAE vice-chair and senior lead mechanical at SSH, highlighted the threat to indoor air quality of terminal units over cooling and contributing to higher humidity levels. He recommended the following order of priority when selecting a terminal unit: sensible load, air flow and lastly total cooling capacity. Hassan Younes, chair of ASHRAE Falcon Chapter and director at GRFN consulting in UAE, focused on ASHRAEs recommendations for reducing the risk of Covid-19 transmission. While the last presentation by Shrikant Sharma, director Smart Analytics at Buro Happold, looked at the prediction of occupant movements and behaviour analytics and how these would influence the design and reoccupation of buildings post-pandemic. He presented post-Covid workplace designs incorporating current social distancing norms and explained how data obtained from movement sensors was driving building planning and design. Virtual roundtable A panel discussion looked at how healthier buildings could be designed in the UAE. The panellists said a strong business case for sustainability and wellbeing was necessary to change the mindset of developers who often looked to low-cost solutions. Data would be important in putting Occupants needed to be educated about the benefits of healthy buildings 22 November 2020 www.cibsejournal.com CIBSE Oct 20 pp22-23 CIBSE Dubai UAE.indd 22 23/10/2020 15:44