The.
Ok, this one or one, so we're going to get started here.
Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to the Resilience 2021 series,
this is titled The Pandemic Impact on Technology and the Built Environment that my name is
Drew Rowland. I'm the vice president of government operations at the National Institute of Building
Sciences. We were established in 1974 by Congress to ensure that all areas of the
built environment work together to utilize the best technology and focus on sustainability by
creating the places we work, live, learn and play.
Developing research and convening experts to solve problems is a part of our overall mission and that
is why we brought you together today.
The COVID 19 Crisis presented architecture, engineering and construction companies with an
enormous challenge in transitioning an industry long, resilient and personal relationships and
in-person connections to a remote digital environment.
The pandemic accelerated the need to bring building sites into the digital era through
automated tools that the digital technology played a critical role in getting the 11
trillion dollar construction industry back on its feet. The shift seen in the building industry not
only shows that is resilient, but is one of the major positive changes emerge from this
crisis. Our goal at NIBS is to work with our partners and agencies to make positive change
and improve our communication and continue to produce research that provides solutions.
First, I definitely would like to think Cloud Visit for sponsoring today's session and now I'd
like to introduce the panelists to you. Today, we have Eric Ortner, a senior
IT program manager at Cloud Visit.
Ortner is a senior IT project manager responsible for bringing Cloud Visit's innovative remote
inspection software to market.
Eric has observed countless virtual inspections over the past five years in real time.
As a result he has identified best practices for the use of remote inspection that are applicable
for any industry. This knowledge has assisted him and Cloud Visit in creating
innovation and technology solutions that suit the most demanding of job site environments.
Prior to joining Cloud Visit Ortner worked as an Art Director and Marketing Consultant.
He graduated in 1998 from the Rochester Institute of Technology with a BFA in Graphic
Design. Next, we have Ryan Colker, Vice President of innovation at the
ICC (International Code Counsel), Ryan Colker is the Vice President of
Innovation and International Code Counsel.
He also serves as the Executive Director of the Alliance for National & Community Resilience,
a national coalition working to provide communities with the tools necessary to
holistically assess and improve their resilience.
Prior to joining ICC, Colker served as Vice President at the National Institute of Building
Sciences, where he led efforts to improve the built environment through the collaboration of
public and private sector industry stakeholders.
He speaks and writes frequently on emerging issues within the built environment, including
resilience, building performance and onsite construction.
As the editor of the book Optimizing Community Infrastructure: Resilience in the Face of Shocks
and Stresses, previously, he served as Manager of Government Affairs at ASHRAE and a
Program Director of Renewable Natural Resources Foundation.
He graduated from the George Washington University Law School and was a B.A.
With honors, in environmental policy from University of Florida. And we have our moderator,
Aundre Oldacre, Managing Partner, AoRa Development.
Aundre's role as a founding partner of AoRa
is to find, evaluate, and prepare deals to be underwritten by lenders and investors. He
implements various strategies to find off market deals that are either
undervalued development sites or add value acquisitions.
Oldacre prioritizes sustainability, through the utilization of renewable energy sources,
municipal tax incentives and programs, virtual doorman and assistants, property management
solutions, and modular building. As as a result, these practices increase IRR for investors and
the firm. So now I will turn it over to Aundre to moderate
and get started.
All right, good afternoon and thanks for joining us.
As Drew mentioned, Aundre Oldacre, Managing Partner of AoRa Development and Vice Chair of the
National Institute of Building Sciences, also on Construction Council.
Today I'll be your moderator, but first we have a few. First, before we we have our speakers, I'd
like to cover a few housekeeping items.
First, each panel will be given 12 minute introduction to cover what they or their
firm is doing to address how pandemic accelerated the need for industrial
utilization of digital tools in the building industry. Second, participation participants
will be able to type questions for the panelists by selecting the Q&A button.
I will select questions from the list of the all panelists have spoken.
Please note there are a large number of participants that will try to get to as many
questions as possible. And third, this session will be recorded in livestream to the NIBS
Facebook page.
The recording and the written summary, including any prominent websites, will be available at NIB
.org later this week.
And now I'll turn it over to our first speaker, Eric Ortner.
Ok, let me just.
OK, everybody can see my screen. Yes, great.
OK, so I'm Eric Ortner and I am senior project manager at Cloud Visit
and Cloud Visit provides a remote venue inspection platform which has been designed for
optimal quality and acceptance within the built environment and.
I've been working at this company for a little over five years now, started back in
2016, and I have watched a lot of remote inspections
take place and it's been really exciting when the pandemic hit.
It's disrupted a lot of lives is a really terrible experience. But I'm sad to say that for me
was a little exciting because I was like, wow, we've got this great technology and this is the
perfect environment for it.
So.
Sorry.
Something's gone wrong with my screen sharing.
You guys can still see my screen.
No, we can't say we can't see. We see you.
There you go.
There we go. Right. OK, so virtual inspection is not a new concept,
it has been implemented in multiple industries for at least 10 years.
The energy and utility industry have been using it to inspect
power lines for offshore wind farms, for offshore oil
rigs. Telecommunications have been using it widely to pay for the huge
5G buildout that's been going on.
Insurance claims inspectors have been using it to verify that
accidents did occur and that the work was conducted as expected and
construction companies have been using it to monitor entire build out projects.
And all of the pandemic has accelerated the use of video
conferencing covid-19 just caused everybody to start
using it when face to face meetings were just no longer an option.
Right now, we're in a webinar, so it's definitely become a
everyday occurrence to use video conferencing.
As a result of this office, workers have discovered that they can work from home and just
as effectively as they can in the office and are requesting more flexibility in it.IT Professionals
are becoming increasingly demanding that they can work off site.
In fact, it's becoming apparent that IT professionals
are actually quitting jobs, that they're forced to work in offices.
And major companies are seeing it as a win win.
So H.R.
departments are realizing that it improves work life balance for employees when employees don't
have to commute to and from work, it gives them more time at home with their family.
It keeps them more available for off-hour meetings and a global economy.
And then also it's reducing operating expenses for companies so they don't have to have as
much rent and they're getting reductions in utility bills.
So Siemens and Ford have been putting their money where their mouth is.
And recently they allowed one hundred and forty thousand employees to work anywhere two to three
days a week. And Ford is allowing thirty thousand of its employees to work from home
permanently. So what these companies have discovered is that
remote work is actually a lot easier than anybody thought to transition to
Kristin Robinson from Ford, the chief people and employee experience officer at Ford Motor
Company said in twenty two and twenty four hours, we went from less than a thousand employees
working remotely globally to around 80000.
So how quickly we're able to pivot and adjust to remote work really surprised me.
I would never have anticipated that the same holds true largely for virtual inspection.
So because big business has realized that this is a very efficient
way to work, municipalities are following suit.
During the pandemic, Tucson, Arizona switched all of its development department to
100 percent virtual inspection.
And more recently, New York City Department of Buildings has announced visual inspection pilot
program. Now, if New York City, which is the largest city in the country, is
taking this remote inspection seriously, you know that this technology is around to stay.
So and it's not just the municipalities, other conservative conservative industries and late
adopters such as the health care industry are also using it within their built environment.
So the health care industry is usually pretty late to adopt new technology.
Doctors don't like to be the first ones to try a new technique because it can end up with
threatening lives.
Now, Washington State Department of Health has said that RVI's allow hospital
administrators and court officials to leverage improved technologies that can become tools in
their toolbox. And it has particular application in larger buildings that require cumbersome
exterior inspections.
Before you'd have to go run a lift, inspect a wall or roof today, those things can and will
start to be inspected via video camera or drone by hospital staffer or a higher third party
contractor. So there's a lot of benefits for using remote
inspection in the built environment, and one of the chief ones is it reduces travel time to job
sites. And, you know, when you have your industry experts running
around the county to review job sites or flying across the country, that
just adds up to time where these highly valuable positions are unable
to do what they do best as a result of the decreased time
in transit. There also are a major reduction in carbon emissions which contribute to
climate change and global warming. Now, in 2021 post pandemic,
we still are looking at another record year for wildfires, fires in California.
And we all have to realize that this global warming thing is happening.
It's not going away and we've all got to do our part to stop
it. So if we can reduce carbon emissions by using remote inspection techniques,
which results in less time flying and driving, why not use it
higher level of employee and quality assurance accuracy with first time?
Right. So a lot of construction build outs these days.
So they'll monitor they'll record the inspection throughout the entire build out project.
And then as that's going on, they can make sure that methods and procedures are followed
correctly. So if something goes wrong in the first half of the installation, they can nip that
mistake in the bud rather than have the whole project completed. Go in and then have to take
disassemble everything and put it back together correctly. It's a major time saver and and it
saves companies a lot of money. And also there's increased on the job safety
associated with it.
There's recordings of JJSA to ensure that all employees are followed,
proper work, safety procedures, and then this all adds up to increased cost efficiency and labor
savings further.
All of this there's even more environmental savings with
this because there's current hosting options that are utilizing
renewable energy to reduce the amount of energy that's going into the
servers that are running the software.
So. With remote inspection, there's tends to
be a inclination to go and work with off the shelf software
like Teams or Zoom or Skype for business, things like that.
And it's great. It's definitely you're definitely able to do that, but it can
impede workflow a little bit.
So as a result, there's a lot of new software out there, Cloud Visits, one of the companies
that that specializes in this, but.
It's created a environment that streamlines work flows dedicated to
remote inspection built environments.
There's been increased demand for work from home and by employees.
And as a result, there needs to be better technology to back up this
demand and actually Cloud Visit has been able to deliver that
Cloud Visit's dedicated remote inspection software system is tailored to the needs of quality
inspectors. We originally designed the software in 2016
for a publicly traded telecommunications company.
Ericsson and covid-19 has definitely increased usage of our remote
inspection software prior to 2020.
We were seeing somewhere around 600 to 800 sessions a day and post 2020.
We're now seeing about a thousand inspection sessions a day globally.
These are sessions conducted all over the world in market areas like Asia,
the European Union and North America.
Now. We're continuing to see further advances in this technology.
This technology is not just stagnating at the video conferencing end of things
advanced with augmented reality and artificial intelligence
are allowing image recognition to become much more prevalent and
available within the software. So now there's inspectors can view
highlights video as it's as it's shown around the the job site to see to
highlight specific items that need to be reviewed.
Users can upload images and it can be automatically inspected by the system
and and are testing the inspection can actually be more accurate than the human eye.
The if a photo has a deficiency off camera to where only
part of the deficiency is noticeable.
The human eye might glance over part of this, but the artificial intelligence
recognizes it immediately and highlights that as a deficiency.
So the technology is definitely progressing.
We're really just at the tip of the iceberg with what's going to happen with this in the future.
Cloud Visit's remote inspection software solution is definitely tailored
to the built environment, there's dedicated desktop and
mobile apps that are used during the inspection.
It all contains a checklist functionality with status, values that
ensure quality requirements are met.
You can track all these status values so that managers can go back and identify
teams that are underperforming and make adjustments where it's necessary
and then all the inspection can be recorded.
You can either record it as like one long walk through video or you can have team members upload
video snippets and then merge everything together for a later compilation.
At the end of the day, everything can be seamlessly shared through the cloud so
that construction managers and engineers, crew members, auditors and
municipalities can all review this work at the click of a button easily.
You don't have to dig through file cabinets from sessions from years ago.
You can just use a search function and it shows up immediately.
So the future is now covid-19 pandemic has proven that virtual inspection
can be a reliable and accurate method and to ensure top quality in the built environment.
Construction and engineering companies, along with municipalities, will be continuing to embrace this
technology as it evolves, and it's going to be survival of the fittest.
Companies that adopt the technology are going to be prospering as a result of it.
And the ones that don't are seriously risking obsolescence.
So at Cloud Visit we're your partner in success and we are offering a
15 percent discount to members of this fine organization,
looking forward to answering some questions today. And also, if you're interested in speaking with us
later, feel free to call schedule at.
Thanks, Eric. Great presentation.
It's exciting to see all the construction, technology and project that's going on in the
industry from predevelopment to speeding up time frames and permitting to
you during construction, as your group does with Cloud Visit and then post construction would
protect technologies that are managing more efficiently and catching errors and mistakes
and maintenance issues, you know, prior to an emergency that.
And now we'll have Ryan Colker with the International Code Council called.
I have had this presentation.
Great, thanks so much, Aundre, and really appreciate the opportunity to reconnect with NIBS
colleagues and really explore some of the key issues that are going on within the building
industry, as Aundre mentioned, Vice President of Innovation at the International Code Council,
which really means I get to look at some of the exciting things that are going on within the
industry and really identifying new opportunities for the Code Counsel to lead or
engage with partners like NIBS to help advance the industry moving forward.
Folks probably know the Code Counsel best for its development of model building
codes, but we also provide a whole host of support services that really help
communities advance resilience, sustainability and safety within their built
environment and within their communities.
And so looking at the various different products and services that are provided within the building
industry, assisting code departments and other administrative functions within communities
in providing services.
Drew mentioned the work of the Alliance for National and Community Resilience and developing a
community resilience benchmarks, and then also providing third party evaluation services,
including plan, review and inspection services.
And so now really with that broad.
Scope of activities and the critical role that code officials play in
advancing safety within the built environment.
Early on, we recognize some of the challenges that code officials and code departments would
face in adapting to covid 19 and the pandemic and really
assuring that construction activities and safe construction activities can continue.
And so we stood up very quickly.
Coronavirus Response Center really start to collect best practices, resources for
code departments and really assist in
keeping communities running as they face sort of new new ways of work and new
requirements, particularly relative to job site inspections and even offices
for code officials themselves.
And so it would certainly recommend folks take a look at the coronavirus response center where
we've captured a whole host of different resources.
Some of those I'll go through today.
So very early on, actually, towards the end of March 2020, we
conducted a survey of code officials and code departments to really understand what's going on
within their jurisdictions. Were they prepared for this new way of work?
Do they have the access to electronic capabilities,
access to code books and those sorts of things?
And so we got about 1200 responses from jurisdictions across the country,
various different population sizes from very small to some of the largest jurisdictions
in the country. And what we found in that early survey was that ninety three percent of
departments were still performing inspections, one form or another, either remotely or in
person. Sixty five percent of them were doing plan review
or inspections remotely, and twenty six percent of them were involved in
temporary occupancy or changes in use, particularly relative to
covid-19. So temporary clinics, those sorts of things.
And so there were certainly a lot of needs for code officials to be able to address
those particular challenges. Some of the additional questions that we asked relative to
virtual capabilities with access to code books is folks have been in code
departments. You know, many of them have, you know, one or two copies of code books in
hard copy. You know, in the office, they're used by everybody in the office.
And when you go to remote work, you know, having access to those hard copy books is
certainly a challenge. 40 percent of the jurisdictions did not have the capability to do
electronic or remote plan reviews.
30 percent did not have the capability to do electronic or remote permitting.
And sixty one percent did not have the capability to do electronic or remote inspections.
And so as code departments were really making that transition, there were already starting from a
place where they hadn't really contemplated the need or really set into motion
the processes and procedures to be able to work remotely.
So looking at the survey from
April and and sort of the desire to identify, you know, how code code
departments have adapted, we conducted the survey in September of
2020 to really see what progress code departments have made and see
if the access to more information or more time to stand up processes
really helped them. So by September, ninety eight percent of jurisdictions were performing
inspections, 40.
Forty forty seven percent.
Had some or all of their employees conducting plan, review or inspections
remotely. Twenty eight percent still did not have the
capability to do electronic or remote permitting.
Thirty nine percent still did not have the capability to do electronic plan review.
And 50 percent still did not have the capacity to do electronic or remote inspection.
So we did see some level of improvement, but certainly huge opportunities to advance
as well. And then this past March, we conducted a survey
in partnership with the Northeast Energy Efficiency Partnership in the Midwest Energy
Efficiency Alliance to look at similar types of questions, not
the same questions, but you get a better sense of sort of where folks are
relative to electronic plan review and remote inspection
particularly. We did have a much lower response rate.
But I think there's still sort of provides some illustrative examples of where
communities are relative to electronic processes.
So we did ask around electronically interview thirty four percent of jurisdictions where were
all electronic. Twenty two percent were all paper and thirty four percent had
some combination of paper and electronic.
The benefits that folks identified from electronic plan review was reduce paper or document
management requirements and streamlined review process.
They did see some barriers, particularly integration with other software that's used within
the community, the need to learn new technology and challenges within the procurement
process. When we asked about remote inspections, fifty nine
percent of jurisdictions were doing in person. Thirty nine percent were doing some combination of
in-person and remote and two percent, which I guess is probably that Tucson example.
We're doing 100 percent remote inspections.
We did ask about benefits of using remote inspections.
This was an open ended question, so we did get sort of a variety of different responses, but some
of the common ones were the ability to perform inspections from any air anywhere with the
caveat that you had to have a good Internet connection on both ends.
Of course, benefits of covid, safety, timesaving, streamlining in the process,
those sorts of things, barriers that we saw was accuracy in some projects,
particularly the ability to sort of dive into the details and actually see what you needed
to see. Coordination and communication with contractors was really another area
that needed some additional work and lack of standards, which we'll talk about in a few
minutes. And then getting personnel trained up to speed and even
actually being able to hire folks that have the necessary skills to conduct remote
inspections. We did ask the question of whether they, the jurisdictions would
continue electronic plan, review and inspection post covid.
Forty one percent said they would, 15 percent are not sure and
16 percent actually answered no.
I suspect some of those no's are from jurisdictions that do not currently have
electronic or remote plan review or inspection processes.
And so really taking all of that information, the identification of needs, the Code
Counsel developed a whole host of resources.
So the documents on the left were sort of early on in the process, giving
communities some considerations for virtual remote inspections,
moving, permitting and plan review online to really sort of identifying, you know, what are the
key questions that they need to ask? What are the key functionalities that they need to think about?
And so we also held based off of those documents, some webinars
with jurisdictions that have gone through the electronic processes.
You can still view those webinars through the ICC Learning Center and look at some of the
examples of communities that have implemented electronic processes.
Since those preliminary documents, we've actually developed two additional documents which
would really support activities within code departments, generally move towards
more electronic processes.
The first was recommended practices for remote virtual inspections.
So certainly more detailed, more guidance than the initial white paper documents on
considerations. But really walking through what are the recommended
practices that communities should use?
I'm taking that one step further.
We recently released a model program for online services, which includes permitting a
planner review and remote inspections, really sort of walking through the process from the very
beginning of what code departments need to do to really set up effective
electronic and online services.
I don't really expect you to read this, but also in the standards arena, we're working
with RESNET to develop a remote virtual inspection standard, particularly
focused on energy and water performance in buildings.
So really, again, addressing that challenge of standardization in this space,
we'll also be working with the Department of Energy and Pacific Northwest National Lab to
develop specific protocols for remote virtual inspection around the
International Energy Conservation Code. I mentioned really the
access to codes as a particular challenge, and so we've
certainly heard those needs. So the Code Counsel has developed a variety of
resources around access to codes.
That is certainly opened up new opportunities for how folks access and use codes.
So it's not just a sort of flat either PDF or hard copy,
but now folks can actually dive into the code, make notes, you
attach a specific code sections to inspection reports and all
of those particular uses that digital codes really open up.
And then actually earlier this week, we released an app that really can provide
codes in the palm of your hand, which is something that hasn't really been available
previously. I did want to touch on one final piece of the
activities that the Code Counsel has been working on, you know,
because code departments are key governmental functions, many of them have been impacted
by covid and access to resources to convert to electronic
processes from municipal budgets has been hard to find.
And so the American rescue plan actually provides funding that code departments can use to
update their services to address electronic needs within
within their departments. And so we've provided a variety of different resources to code departments
to really help them access these resources and make use of this funding availability.
And so these links will be included in the NIBS follow up to the
webinar. But a whole host of solutions can be covered
under the American rescue plan, generally support communities in moving forward in their
electronic processes.
So things like access to digital codes, implementation of an online
services program, access to third party plan review, standing
up, electronic permitting processes and records management, access to remote
virtual inspections and getting set up in that process, and then
specifically working on local building code activities.
And so with that, you know, we've certainly identified the opportunities that
covid has provided to move jurisdictions forward in the use of technology, and we'll continue to
develop resources to really help move things forward.
So really appreciate the opportunity to share what we've found and look forward to the discussion.
Thanks, Ryan. So now a little bit about AoRa Development, as I said, we're
very forward thinking developers in New York City mainly focused in New
York City area, and we focus a lot.
We do some acquisition, but a lot more development.
And we're mainly focused on modular constructions. We're big believers in the efficiencies that it
brings and other modern construction techniques.
And we try to remain very flexible because the technology is moving so fast.
We create visions for projects that excites our investors while maximizing the zoning
and highest and best, best use.
And third, we create strategies that alternative revenue streams that tenants will appreciate, like
protec and building opening virtual doorman systems.
And and lastly, we implement renewable energy systems,
remain sustainable and low utility costs and much better for the environment.
So without any further ado, let's get to the Q&A section here.
So Thomas Phips, I'm sorry, Thomas Phillips, as I believe, he is talking
about Cloud Visit how does it record and verify inspections where
systems need to meet the time sequence?
You talk about fire alarm and fire system inspections.
Well, everything's recorded in real time.
All right, so, you know, we have multiple video feeds
available, so if if you're in one portion of the building,
you can have a video feed there and then you can have it to trip the alarm and then
you can record both portions just by clicking the button.
Does that answer your question?
I believe that, answers Thomas.
Second, by Susan Eibner, how does Cloud visit interface with them Revit
software?
Hmm, I'm not familiar with that one, unfortunately, but we can do
APIs with pretty much anything that has an open API.
All right, Lily, Eliot asked what equipment or technology
devices are necessary to use Clod Visit's software.
So the technological requirements are really minimal.
You just need a desktop computer for the inspector with a webcam and microphone
and mobile device could be a tablet or smartphone.
And that's and a good Internet connection.
We recommend one megabyte per second upload and download speeds and latencies not exceed 450
milliseconds. And other than that, it's pretty much.
The that's it.
It's so, so high requirements are minimal, there's not there's not a whole lot of obstacles to bring
this online.
It's pretty obtainable for anyone.
All right, kind of, Snyder asked, has anyone been using remote inspections as a training tool for
the designers and or tradespeople?
I can answer that question. And absolutely
so for our telecom client, they actually do on the job
inspections and reviews for quality audits.
And they do training directly in communication towers.
In with the inspections, so, yeah, that's definitely happening.
Anybody else to add to that question?
And Thomas Phillips asks.
Has this technology been certified or accepted by standard development organizations?
For ISSO, so, yeah, we're fully ISSO compliant.
John, Poland and Eric, how does your local jurisdictions secure your
technology,
Our local jurisdiction?
It actually it doesn't where we're working in Cold Spring, New York,
and they are not currently using us, but really.
Anybody can sign up, so it's just
A matter of them not signing up. And now it looks like we're switching to the ICC
questions, can you tell us more about the app the ICC released?
When was that released?
Yeah, so that was actually released in beta yesterday, but folks can
access it's really a mechanism to be able to access
codes from your smartphone, from your tablet.
A lot of the same functionality that you have from our digital codes platform of
being able to access codes from the field.
So certainly inspectors and other folks can have it handy.
You can include notes on different code provisions and so you can access it
either as an individual or as a department wide subscription as
well.
All right, and Christine Peterson, as the epidemic accelerated
the need to bring building sites into the digital era through automated tools, do you see the
industry staying current as new technologies emerge?
Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, covid certainly demonstrated a lot of the benefits that that Eric
talked about relative to travel time using various different A.I.
and augmented reality, I think.
I think we'll certainly continue to see that that trajectory within the building industry,
but I think, you know, as most folks on the webinar probably recognize, the building industry
in and of itself is usually slow to adopt new technologies.
But I hope the sort of the benefits that we've seen from implementing these
technologies during covid has at least accelerated that uptake.
I don't expect that will transform overnight, but I think it sort of sets us off on a
new trajectory towards adoption of more and more advanced technology.
And Daniel Gilbert asks for Ryan again, can you further detail further
the federal money grants available for procurement of the remote inspection software?
Yeah, so the American recovery plan
provided about three hundred and fifty billion dollars to states and
localities to address covid related
challenges. And so one of the eligible activities is
to support transition of state and locality departments to better
address covid related challenges.
And so you use of remote inspection certainly qualifies as part of that.
I would recommend that code departments and others that are interested in deploying this technology
work with usually it's a state hazard mitigation officer or some sort of
emergency management personnel that sort of works with those funds.
And they can they can walk you through sort of the specifics and the requirements within your
department or your state.
I would also point folks to there's an advocacy section on the coronavirus response
center that I shared earlier, which includes more details on, you know, use
of those dollars to support code departments in advancing their technology
solutions.
Question from Kenneth Schneider, what is ISO standards are you referring to
for our club, you?
Security, privacy.
I mean, I say I think specifically to sort of, you know,
talking about accreditation and evaluation of a variety
of different technology products within the building space, as I mentioned, the building
industry is a pretty slow to sort of pick up technologies.
And so we don't have a lot of sort of infrastructure around
assessment and evaluation of these these processes yet.
I would see that coming to assure that we're meeting the needs of communities and
supporting code departments in advancing building safety.
So I think we'll see more and more certifications, accreditations and
evaluations on the horizon.
OK.
And from an anonymous viewer for Ryan or public libraries utilizing the
online codes.
Yes, so there are actually two to, I guess, call it versions
of digital codes, so one is the basic version so anybody can
access read only versions of most of the ICC
codes and standards with the premium version, you get all
of those additional features that I mentioned relative to sharing notes within your code
department, cutting and pasting to provide specific code sections
in, say, inspection reports, those sorts of things.
You also get access to a variety of different standards that are actually referenced within the
codes themselves. So anyone can view the codes through the basic version, but
for primarily for code departments, designers and other folks that really want to make the
most of their access to codes, there are additional services and tools
available to do that.
And Ryan, we're both involved in the NIBS off site construction council.
How is the Code Counsel engaged in off site and how has covid impacted technology usage
to support off site?
Yeah, so offsite construction is certainly one of the other areas where I focus a lot and the
Code Counsel is really identified, the opportunities that our site construction provides,
you know, relative to workforce challenges, sustainability, a lot of the affordable housing
issues that we're facing.
And so it's really an opportunity to help move the industry forward.
And so one of our subsidiaries, NTA, which does provide a lot of third party plan,
review and inspection services for the off site construction industry,
is actually implementing remote inspection processes for several of the
factories that they work with.
So, for example, there's a project here in Washington, D.C., where the
offsite construction components are actually being manufactured in Poland.
And DC has recognized the ability to use remote inspection services
to inspect the activities going on within the plant in Poland.
And so they've they've implemented those processes.
So I certainly see that expanding as well within the off site construction space.
Absolutely. We're creating tools to support the effective use of off site construction,
including standards to support building code compliance, approval of evaluation, evaluation
processes and module contracts and design guidance.
So we are streamlining the process to take our industry from a four percent
industry in the modular world to more of a mainstream dealing with the
government agencies like Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, and did a
code program to standardize the practices and best lending practices that will
filter to the local municipalities.
So.
Last question. Yeah, I mean, we could we could have we can have a whole conversation around
offsite construction, but yeah, I mean, we've been working on standards to support
off off site construction, particularly in the in the code environment that actually should be
available probably next month.
So really a lot of exciting stuff going on with an off site construction space.
And last question we have here, you mentioned how code departments have adapted to
covid, what feedback have you gotten from contractors and designers?
Yeah, so we we.
You know, departments have certainly recognized the need to move to electronic processes,
the feedback that we've gotten from contractors is in general, they really like,
you know, not having to go to the counter to submit their permits.
Usually it's quicker to to go through plan review processes.
It's much more streamlined process for them.
I think the challenge is sort of getting code departments and contractors sort of on the same
page, assuring that they're using the same technology and really
just having that that level of comfort with shifting to an electronic process.
All right, group. Well, it looks like we're ending a little early here, I don't see any more
questions, so I guess that concludes the webinar on the
pandemic's impact on technology and the built environment. Thank you guys all for joining us.
I wanted to close out.
Thank you. Again, I want to thank all of the participants and specifically
on behalf of Lakisha Woods and the rest of NIBS, Eric, Ryan as
as panelist and Aundre as a moderator.
Thank you for providing your time and expertise.
We'd also like to have you join us on August 11 to continue this
series on resilience and address wildfire season and wildland
urban interface resiliency.
So, again, thank you, moderators.
Thank you, panelists, and thank you audience for joining us.
And we'll see you next time. Thank you.
Thank you. Thanks, everybody.
Thank.