Maintaining MEP

Even this is not always possible as Alsuwaidi reveals: "It depends on the client commitment. With air conditioning some clients say: ‘let me think about it', then when winter starts they forget about it."

Attitudes of developers in the Middle East can also be a bone of contention for FM professionals due to the ‘everything now' mentality that surrounds construction projects. Babu says: "Clients at times do not realise the importance in having their equipment maintained. This is also a very important aspect in terms of energy usage."

Cairney reveals the impact of LEED assessments on buildings could make the life of an FM professional easier: "It is becoming compulsory to LEED assess your buildings and this requires a full set of commissioning records at completion of the building and 12 months later a further set of re-commissioning data."

The advantage gained by this is it forces some "proper thought" to go into the commissioning process, reports Cairney.

Active thinking

Like the majority of the facilities in a building, MEP systems can be maintained either reactively or proactively.

Reactive maintenance, waiting for something to break before it is fixed, involves less short-term cost and can be useful for systems that operate without any work needed on them. Proactive maintenance, on the other hand, involves creating and following a plan to regularly maintain systems and machinery in an attempt to prevent breakdowns.

Cairney describes proactive maintenance as: "actually going to oil and grease the wheels on a planned regular basis. And when things do break down you analyse the root cause of the problem and seek a fix that will have a proper lasting effect."

Unfortunately, the trend in the Middle East is to use reactive maintenance. However, the tide seems to be changing towards preventative maintenance on MEP systems and it is not just FM companies who are looking to encourage this shift.

Alsuwaidi says: "I think the government is pushing for more preventative maintenance. It's coming and its improving and this is why there are more facilities management companies now operating rather than just maintenance companies or service providers."

Alsuwaidi also highlights a more important reason to shift towards proactive maintenance techniques: "I'm sorry to say that in some cases safety equipment that is not service-tied is still not fixed. If the air conditioning breaks in the summer everybody will complain, so they will do reactive and preventive maintenance to avoid this."

Alsuwidi continues: "But there are other devices like fire alarms that if they fail, [some firms and/or building owners] don't even bother to do preventive maintenance until the whole tower fails."

Cairney sees the move towards proactive maintenance as both inevitable and rapid: "There is a rapid move towards proactive maintenance, particularly in more sophisticated buildings. I think reaction is still inherent in villas and houses, but proactive is much more prevalent now in the big developments."

There are new technologies in the industry not being widely used in the Middle East as Dalton explains: "If I go back to the UK its quite commonplace that when you are installing a building management system you put in extra sensors so you can monitor the chiller and you can monitor the air in a more predictive way. Instead of changing filters every few months you can actually leave it a little bit longer."

MEP systems present a range of challenges for FM professionals. However these are challenges that can be overcome through design stage involvement and a stronger shift towards proactive maintenance.

The FM industry seems to have a grasp on this and it is only a matter of time before the developers and building owners do as well.

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