BOMA Canada recently launched an eagerly awaited updated version of its prestigious certification, BOMA BEST Sustainable Buildings, and also announced the creation of BOMA BEST Intelligent Buildings, a new, innovative certification for building owners and managers.
BOMA BEST Sustainable Buildings 4.0 establishes an industry standard for commercial real estate. Building on the success of BOMA BEST 3.0, the program now emphasizes issues such as decarbonization, improving building air quality, the health of building occupants, accessibility, equity and resilience.
''The objective of BOMA BEST is continuous improvement of the built environment to help drive our industry forward,'' said Benjamin Shinewald, president and CEO of BOMA Canada.
BOMA BEST 3.0 was launched in 2016. The ensuing years have seen many significant changes in the green building sector across the country. Next-generation certification will further help companies to innovate and adopt evolving best practices.
BOMA BEST 4.0 is the result of over a year of meticulous consultations with hundreds of BOMA members and other stakeholders. Reflecting their feedback, key changes in BOMA BEST 4.0 include consolidation from 16 to 12 core practices (formerly known as best practices), streamlining into six focus areas and reducing the number of questions in the questionnaire.
To help building owners and managers achieve their GHG emission reduction goals, BOMA BEST 4.0 also evaluates four new aspects: decarbonization, equity, commitment and resilience.
A six-month period of overlap between BOMA BEST 3.0 and BOMA BEST 4.0 is planned. The deadline for registering new buildings under BOMA BEST 3.0 was March 31, while the last chance for submitting the questionnaire and requesting BOMA BEST 3.0 verification is September 30, 2023.
BOMA BEST Intelligent Buildings is an innovative certification for building owners and managers who invest in intelligent technologies for their buildings. There has been a growing need over the years for a new, rigorous certification to set an industry benchmark, and to help owners and managers assess their performance and ensure the value of their investments and their assets.
BOMA BEST Intelligent Buildings also serves as a management tool, enabling owners and managers to optimize their operations, promote sustainability, create better user experiences and deliver financial value to their landlords and tenants.
Buildings certified BOMA BEST Intelligent Buildings will have access to the new BOMA BEST hub, which provides tools for generating performance reports and roadmaps enabling users to assess, monitor and achieve their objectives. The platform includes benchmarking reports, interactive dashboards, a document library and recommendations.
BOMA BEST Intelligent Buildings is open to commercial, industrial and institutional buildings in all asset categories, including office buildings, light industrial buildings, enclosed and open shopping centres, multi-unit residential buildings, healthcare buildings and universal buildings.
Buildings seeking BOMA BEST Intelligent Buildings certification will be evaluated in five key areas, including safety and security, operations and management, network and integration, user experience, and performance and analysis reports.
Some of the industry's leading firms have already obtained BOMA BEST Intelligent Buildings certification as part of a pilot program deployed over the past few months, which was the case for Place Ville Marie (Ivanhoe Cambridge). Certified Silver, it was the first building in Quebec to obtain this new certification.
These two launches were an opportunity for BOMA Canada to roll out the dynamic new BOMA BEST brand image, accompanied by a new website where interested parties can obtain all the information they need about both programs.
For more details, visit www.bomabest.org
by BOMA Quebec
Source: BOMA Canada