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Mat 05 Designing for durability and resilience

Number of credits available Minimum standards
1 No

Aim

To recognise and encourage adequate protection of exposed elements of the building and landscape, therefore minimising the frequency of replacement and maximising materials optimisation.

Assessment criteria

The following is required to demonstrate compliance:

One credit

Protecting vulnerable parts of the building from damage

  1. The building incorporates suitable durability and protection measures or designed features/solutions to prevent damage to vulnerable parts of the internal and external building and landscaping elements. This must include, but is not necessarily limited to:
    1. Protection from the effects of high pedestrian traffic in main entrances, public areas and thoroughfares (corridors, lifts, stairs, doors etc.).
    2. Protection against any internal vehicular/trolley movement within 1m of the internal building fabric in storage, delivery, corridor and kitchen areas.
    3. Protection against, or prevention from, any potential vehicular collision where vehicular parking and manoeuvring occurs within 1m of the external building façade for all car parking areas and within 2m for all delivery areas.

Protecting exposed parts of the building from material degradation

  1. The relevant building elements incorporate appropriate design and specification measures to limit material degradation due to environmental factors. (See Mat 05 Designing for durability and resilience for the process to assess this criterion).

See Table 50 in the Checklists and tablessection for a list of applicable elements, environmental factors and material degradation effects to consider.

Checklists and tables

Table 50 Applicable building elements, environmental factors and material degradation effects to consider

Applicable building elements, environmental factors and material degradation effects
Applicable building elements
  1. Foundation/substructure/lowest floor/retaining walls
  2. External walls
  3. Roof/balconies
  4. Glazing: windows, skylight
  5. External doors
  6. Railings/balusters (where exposed to external environment)
  7. Cladding (where exposed to external environment)
  8. Staircase/ramps (where exposed to external environment)
  9. Hard landscaping
Environmental factors
  1. Environmental agents, including:
    1. Solar radiation
    2. Temperature variation
    3. Water/moisture
    4. Wind
    5. Precipitation, e.g. rain and snow
    6. Extreme weather conditions: high wind speeds, flooding, driving rain, snow
  2. Biological agents, including:
    1. Vegetation
    2. Pests, insects
  3. Pollutants, including:
    1. Air contaminants
    2. Ground contaminants
Material degradation effects (includes, but not necessarily limited to the following)
  1. Corrosion
  2. Dimensional change, e.g. swelling or shrinkage
  3. Fading/discolouration
  4. Rotting
  5. Leaching
  6. Blistering
  7. Melting
  8. Salt crystallisation
  9. Abrasion

Compliance notes

Ref

Terms

Description

Shell and core

CN1 

Applicable assessment criteria

Protecting vulnerable parts of the building from damage - criterion 1

Where vulnerable elements identified form part of the shell and core developer’s remit:

Both options: All assessment criteria relevant to the building type and function apply and must be accounted for in the assessment of this issue.

Where vulnerable elements identified are internal and do not form a part of the shell and core developer's remit, i.e. they are in speculative areas and compliance is subject to the tenants/future occupiers fit-out specification:

Both options: These areas can be excluded from assessment.

Protecting exposed parts of the building from material degradation - criterion 2

Both options: All criteria relevant to the building type and function apply.

Refer to Appendix D – BREEAM UK New Construction and Shell and Core Project Assessments for a more detailed description of the above shell and core assessment options.

Simple buildings

CN2 

Applicable assessment criteria All criteria relevant to the building type and function apply.
General

CN3

Suitable durability measures
See criterion 1.

Suitable durability and protection measures to vulnerable parts of the building can include:

  1. Bollards/barriers/raised kerbs to delivery and vehicle drop-off areas
  2. Robust external wall construction, up to 2m high
  3. Corridor walls specified to Severe Duty (SD) as per BS 5234-21BS 5234-2: Partitions (including matching linings) – Specification for performance criteria for strength and robustness including methods of test, BSI 1992.and, for Healthcare buildings, Health Technical Memorandum 56 - Partitions2HTM 56 Partitions, 3rd Edition, Department of Health, 2005..
  4. Protection rails to walls of corridors
  5. Kick plates/impact protection (from trolleys etc.) on doors
  6. Hard-wearing and easily washable floor finishes in heavily used circulation areas (i.e. main entrance, corridors, public areas etc.)
  7. Designing out the risk without the need for additional materials specification to protect vulnerable areas.

CN3.1 

Vehicle impact protection
See criterion 1c.

Any vehicle impact protection measures specified must be positioned at an adequate distance from the building to protect the fabric from impact from any vehicle with a measurable overhang of the body from the wheel track, in particular for any goods delivery areas.

In vehicle movement areas only; where the specification of external robust wall construction is specified to comply with the credit, additional protection must be provided to ensure against potential damage to the robust façade from vehicle movement, i.e. specifying bollards or protection rails.

CN3.2 

Preventing excessive material use The specification or design measures chosen should reflect the need to balance the additional specification of materials with the need to protect building elements to minimise their replacement, insuring against excessive material use and promoting materials optimisation.

CN3.3 

Public/common areas Consideration should be given to materials specification in public/common areas (especially public waiting areas and toilet areas) to provide protection against potential malicious or physical abuse, as far as possible.

Methodology

Protecting exposed parts of the building from material degradation

The following outlines the process to assess criterion 2.

  1. Identify from the list of ‘applicable building elements’ under Table 50 the elements that are appropriate to the building being assessed.
  2. Establish from the ‘environmental factors’ list those factors that are likely to cause material degradation effects in the identified applicable building elements.
  3. Confirm the design and specification measures in place to limit these degradation effects.
  4. The assessor should use their professional judgement in determining whether the design team have adequately demonstrated that they have designed and specified materials and/or measures which will be effective in preventing unnecessary deterioration, so reducing frequent replacements, repairs and maintenance through the life cycle of the building.
  5. At post construction stage, where the design and specification measures installed differ from those proposed at design stage, the assessor must ensure that these measures still meet the aims of the criterion as detailed in point 4 above.

Evidence

Criteria Interim design stage
Final post construction stage
All

One or more of the appropriate evidence types listed in The BREEAM evidential requirements section can be used to demonstrate compliance with these criteria.

Additional information

Relevant definitions

Materials efficiency
Refer to BREEAM issue Mat 04 Insulation

Other information

None.


BREEAM UK New Construction non-domestic buildings technical manual 2014
Reference: SD5076 – Issue: 5.0
Date: 23/08/2016
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