The Australian Institute of Refrigeration, Air Conditioning and Heating (AIRAH) has established a Special Technical Group (STG) focusing on resilience.
The resilience group joins other dedicated Special Technical Groups on ESD, solar cooling, backflow prevention, and refrigeration.
AIRAH CEO Tony Gleeson said the Resilient Design Institute defines resilience as the capacity to adapt to changing conditions and to maintain or regain functionality and vitality in the face of stress or disturbance
“It is the capacity to bounce back after a disturbance or interruption of some sort, especially extreme weather events,” Mr Gleeson said.
“AIRAH aims to be the leading independent voice for the industry on resilience, sustainability, compliance, innovation and the transition to low-GWP refrigerants. The formation of the Resilience STG fits right in with our strategic focus in this area.”
The AIRAH Resilience Special Technical Group aims to increase awareness of resilience as a design principle, gather knowledge of resilient design approaches, generate resilient design tools and strategies, and fill in resilience knowledge gaps specific to the HVAC&R industry.
Co-chair of AIRAH’s Resilience STG, Paul Stoller said, “We live in a world of extreme weather events such as bushfires, cyclones, floods and heatwaves.
“There are chronic stresses such as temperature rise and more extreme weather. Then there are the possible stresses such as urbanisation, energy costs and risk management. A means of dealing with all this is resilience.”
AIRAH executive manager – government relations and technical services Phil Wilkinson oversees the Institute’s STGs.
“The STGs represent a fantastic resource for AIRAH,” Mr Wilkinson said.
“They contain an incredible wealth of knowledge that simply needs to be tapped. As part of my technical remit, I’ll be working closely with the Resilience STG to harness the information and considerable talent of those involved.”
