CIBSE Updates Guidance For Improved Safety & Sustainability In Public Health

The Chartered Institution of Building Services Engineers’ (CIBSE) ‘Guide G: Public Health and plumbing engineering’ has been updated and published. A hard copy of the publication can now be ordered online through the CIBSE Knowledge Portal and is available for download for free of charge to CIBSE members.

Produced in collaboration with the Chartered Institution of Plumbing and Heating Engineers (CIPHE), the Guide is essential reading for plumbing and heating engineers, public health designers, installers and practitioners involved with such systems. Reading the publication will offer guidance across a range of systems from underground drainage and treatment, pumps and gaseous piped services to swimming pools, steam and condensate. The Guide complements the Health and Safety Executive’s Approved Code of Practice and guidance revised L8 ‘Legionnaires’ disease – The control of legionella bacteria in water systems’.

With UK population increasing and cities becoming more densely populated it is critical to ensure sanitary water quality and plumbing systems to protect public health. The Guide offers authoritative standards and addresses critical matters such as water treatment, irrigation, steam, condensate and
legionnaires disease. In his foreword, Paul Angus, Chair, CIBSE Guide G Steering Group writes: “Since the second edition of CIBSE Guide G was published, various amendments to the Building Regulations, British Standards and the introduction of new codes have heavily influenced the content of this new edition. In particular, the emphasis on water conservation and sustainability has had an impact on many chapters, as well as resulted in the Guide being reformatted.”

The modern day public health design engineer has a significant role to play, not only in reducing the consumption of water and energy but also in looking at the wider environmental impact of the systems designed and materials specified. Therefore, the chapter on conservation and sustainability is a useful overview of advice on such matters.