Whole Life Costing
Whole-life costing of design alternatives is performed together with project cost consultants to highlight the long-term sustainability and life-cycle benefits of design alternatives. In capital cost terms options such as increased insulation, air tight construction, taller floor to floor heights and appropriate user controls can be difficult to justify yet are essential for low-carbon and low cost operation.
While the long-term benefits of many such measures are quantifiable, occupant well-being, productivity and broader architectural and urban considerations such as landmark value are only now coming to the foreground. We are conducting several research projects that aim to quantify and set design methods to make these benefits more visible during design.
Together with the Sustainability team, the Advanced Modelling Group has developed assessment tools that can link changes in briefing criteria, building form and construction methods to updates in capital cost, building efficiency and whole-life cost. Such modelling informs the briefing, design and construction of projects and can lead to substantial savings in the capital and running cost of projects.
Whole life costing diagram