Analyse the impact of design decisions which fulfils the economic needs of the client and addresses the issues of the Whole Life Cycle Cost (WLCC) of the building.
You work as a technician in a multi-disciplinary practice that has recently been commissioned by a speculative developer to design a new ten storey office building. The proposed building is to be located on a city centre site, is intended to provide for multiple occupancy and accommodate sophisticated services, including those for data communication. You have been asked to contribute to the overall design process by developing a WLCC report highlighting key areas in the design that would enable the client to achieve a manageable and reasonable Whole Life Costing (40 -50 years) for the new building.
Based on the above scenario, you are required to perform the following task:
• Discuss the primary purpose of WLCC and explain why construction industry has failed to embrace WLCC.
• Discuss the risk, uncertainty and subjectiveness in WLCC and how present cost and future cost can be evaluated to aid decision making.
• Using worked example, examine the economic factors that arises specifically with building maintenance, in relation to whole life costing considering.
o The assumption about the service life
o Risk of failure of the component
o Assumption about frequency and time intervals required to carry out the maintenance or replacement.
• Justify how the balance between technical and design decisions can affect the need to optimise the Whole Life Costing of the building.
