ASHRAE Insights

The Handbook Committee has published a new edition of its Authors and Revisers Guide (ARG).

Partly in response to recommendations from recent ASHRAE Handbook improvement workshops, the new ARG recommends the inclusion of practical guidance on sustainability, extraordinary events, commissioning, installation considerations, and operation and maintenance.

ASHRAE technical committees are responsible for the revision and creation of chapters in the four-volume ASHRAE Handbook and are the primary users of the ARG.

“The new ARG recommendations for additional practical and sustainability-related information are based on engineers’ comments at focus group discussions,” said Brian Rock, Handbook Committee chair. “The engineers overwhelmingly recommended that these ideas be incorporated wherever possible, so the challenge is for the members of TCs to go back to their chapters and critically review and update them as appropriate,” he said.

The guide also recommends matrices of system and equipment types and applications; guidance on writing design narratives; overview diagrams of systems, equipment, and energy flows; and industry standard details and schedules for applicable items.

Some of the recommended improvements already will be reflected in the recently released four-volume ASHRAE HandbookCD+ 2004–2007 as well as in next year’s 2008 ASHRAE Handbook—HVAC Systems and Equipment.

The new ARG can be downloaded from ASHRAE.org on the Handbook page under the Publications tab.