A Living Building Case Study

Net zero is not a design label; it is an operational condition that must be measured, verified, and sustained over time. This session brings together three perspectives to show how high-performance buildings become living systems: the operational reality from PAE’s Living Building team, the standards-and-semantic-alignment lens from NIST, and the systems-of-systems interoperability approach developed through long-term owner portfolios.

We start with a simple truth: PAE stated directly, “You don’t design a net zero energy building, you operate a net zero energy building.” That shift, from predicted performance to verified performance, requires more than dashboards. It requires continuity: a way to connect design intent, building systems, measured signals, and human workflows without losing intelligence at handover.

This session introduces an Architecture of Intelligence, not as a single platform but as a repeatable pattern that owners and project teams can deliberately design. We will frame this continuity using widely adopted standards: ISO 19650 for BIM information management, ISO 55000 for asset management, and ASHRAE 223P for semantic interoperability between design models and operational data—supported by open-source efforts and industry coalitions such as the Linux Foundation and the Coalition for Smarter Buildings (C4SB).

We will show how shared identifiers, semantic structure (including ASHRAE 223P concepts), and interoperable connections across systems allow measured operational data to support real workflows such as fault detection, diagnostics, and performance verification. The focus is practical: how to sustain performance after occupancy, reduce manual reconciliation costs, and make buildings legible to humans, operators, and AI.

Finally, we scale the same approach beyond one building. Large owner portfolios, such as the California Community Colleges, demonstrate how governance and shared truth enable performance data and operational workflows to persist across millions of square feet, creating a foundation for scalable verification, accountability, and long-term resilience.

Attendees will leave with a clear workflow pattern for connecting models to measured evidence, and a set of implementation steps they can apply immediately, whether they manage one building or an entire portfolio.

Learning Objectives (4)

Shift from Design Outcomes to Operational Outcomes

Understand why net zero and sustainability performance must be operated, verified, and maintained over time, not just designed and documented.

Connect Design Intent to Operational Evidence

Learn how shared identifiers and semantic relationships enable continuity between BIM, building systems, and measured time-series data.

Build Interoperable “Living Systems” Without Vendor Lock-In

See how APIs, open schemas, and standards-based alignment help teams integrate across systems while preserving long-term adaptability.

Apply a Repeatable Architecture of Intelligence Pattern

Walk away with a practical implementation stack for sustaining performance: governance, minimum shared truth, connectivity across systems, participation, and metrics-to-action workflows.