In this section you will find news and articles related to ISO/TC 59 and its subcommittees.

News and updates

  • By Hege Sjølie

    on

    ISO/TC 59 Plenary Week 2026 in Oslo – celebrating 80 years of international collaboration

    From 19 to 23 October 2026, ISO/TC 59 Buildings and civil engineering works will gather in Oslo and Sandvika, Norway, for a full week of meetings, discussions and international collaboration.

    This year’s Plenary Week will be particularly special. In addition to meetings across ISO/TC 59 and its subcommittees, we will open the week with a conference bringing together international ISO experts and representatives from the Norwegian building and construction sector. We will also celebrate 80 years of ISO/TC 59 with a reception at Oslo City Hall.

  • By Hege Sjølie

    on

    ISO/TC 59 Newsletters

    The ISO/TC 59 Newsletter, which gives a brief indication of current or recent affairs in our committee, is issued twice a year by the secretariat.

  • By Kari S. Borgos

    on

    Digitalisation use case

    Digitalisation enables huge opportunities for the world's construction industry. Benefits are increased productivity, reduced costs and reduction in greenhouse gas emissions in the built environment. Standards will play an important role in reaching these goals.

    This was part of the rationale when, upon invitation, the ISO/TC 59 and SC 13 leaderships submitted a potential digitalisation use case to the ISO SMART programme - now IEC-ISO SMART - earlier this year.

  • By David Churcher, Project Leader for ISO 19650-3 in SC 13/WG 13

    on

    New standard for more efficient operation of assets and facilities

    Part 3: Operational phase of the assets, a new part in the ISO 19650 series on information management using building information modelling (BIM), has recently been published. The new standard is particularly aimed at the asset and facilities managers who are responsible for keeping built environment assets operating properly, and the contractors/works teams they appoint to do work on their assets and facilities. Read more about the standard and what it offers here.

  • By Alex Luck, Project Leader for ISO 19650-5 in SC 13/WG 13

    on

    New standard for security-minded information management

    The new ISO 19650-5:2020 Organization and digitization of information about buildings and civil engineering works, including building information modelling (BIM) – Information management using building information modelling – Part 5: Security-minded approach to information management is a specification for security-minded information management. It provides a framework to assist organizations in understanding the key vulnerability issues and the nature of the controls required to manage the resultant security risks to a level that is tolerable to the relevant parties.

  • By Lisbet Landfald, Committee Manager of SC 13

    on

    More efficient BIM processes

    The new ISO 23386:2020 Building information modelling and other digital processes used in construction — Methodology to describe, author and maintain properties in interconnected data dictionaries will allow the exchange of information between data dictionaries in a uniform manner. This will make the BIM processes more efficient and the information exchange more reliable.

  • By Lisbet Landfald, Committee Manager of SC 13

    on

    Container format for exchange of files

    A new standard developed in ISO/TC 59/SC 13/WG 8 defines an open and stable container format to exchange files of a heterogeneous nature to deliver, store and archive documents that describe an asset throughout its entire lifecycle.

  • By Karine Dari, Committee Manager of SC 17

    on

    SC 17 in two pages

    Would you like to know more about the work on sustainability in buildings and civil engineering works? SC 17 has made a handy overview of who they are and what they do.

  • By Lisbet Landfald

    on

    Successful meetings on digitalization in Singapore

    The leadership of ISO/TC 59/SC 13 recently met with the Building and Construction Authority (BCA) and the Institution of Engineers, Singapore (IES) standards development organisation in Singapore to discuss digitalization in the global building and construction industry.

  • By Kari S. Borgos

    on

    New project proposals in SC 8

    How do you determine the surface cure time of a sealant, and how do you evaluate the application life of a multi-component sealant?

    Currently, China is proposing two new standards in SC 8 "Sealants" that will help answer these questions. The proposed new standards are under ballot until 7 April 2020.  

  • By Kari S. Borgos

    on

    Appreciation to former ISO/TC 59 Chair, Per Jæger

    During the ISO/TC 59 Advisory Group meeting week in Longyearbyen in October, Per Jæger was awarded ISO's Certificate of Appreciation for his considerable contribution to ISO activities and in particular for his dedication to the work of ISO/TC 59.

  • By Andreas T. Wolf, Chair of SC 8 "Sealants"

    on

    SC 8 Meetings in Guangzhou, China

    Subcommittee SC 8 "Sealants", seven of its Working Groups and five Ad Hoc Groups met in Guangzhou, China, during three days in October 2018. Experts and delegates from Belgium, China, France, Germany, Netherlands, Japan, Korea, United Kingdom and the USA were attending the meetings.

  • By Rodney McPhee, Chair of ISO/TC 59/SC 2

    on

    ISO/TC 59 and SC 2 Work with ISO Central Secretariat to Clarify ISO Directives

    In their work monitoring and coordinating the terminology activity under the ISO/TC 59 umbrella, SC 2 "Terminology and harmonization of languages" made an important observation following the publication of the 2016 edition of the ISO/IEC Directives Part 2.

  • By Kari S. Borgos, ISO/TC 59 Secretary

    on

    Planning of security measures in the built environment

    Over the past 20 years, protection against malicious acts has gained increased attention due to acts of terrorism, sabotage and vandalism. The objective of an attack can be to destroy, damage or appropriate an asset, or compromise information held by the asset. The assets in need of protection can both be the built environment in itself, or entities contained in the built environment. A proposed new standard in ISO/TC 59 will provide requirements and recommendations for effective planning and design of security measures in the built environment.

  • By Dana K. “Deke” Smith, FAIA, Co-Chair APPA TCO 1000 Committee

    on

    ISO/TC 59 at the Heart of Facility and Infrastructure Industry Transformation

    A standard for Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) is being developed by APPA (APPA: Leadership in Educational Facilities) which is a recognized American National Standard Institute, ANSI, Standards Development Organization. Why is this important to ISO/TC 59? Because the APPA TCO standard is based on its ISO 15686 Service Life and links to ISO 55000 Asset Management, an effort of ISO/TC 251, and ISO 41000 Facility Management, the work of ISO/TC 267.

  • By Kari S. Borgos

    on

    ISO 16745 Parts 1 and 2: Carbon metric of an existing building during the use stage

    The recently published ISO 16745 series, developed by SC 17/WG 4 under the leadership of Prof. Tomonari Yashiro (Japan), sets out a globally applicable common method of measuring and reporting of associated GHG emissions (and removals) attributable to existing buildings, by providing requirements for the determining and reporting of a carbon metric(s) of a building.

  • By Betzy Dinesen, Editor for buildingSMART International

    on

    Recognition status launched by buildingSMART

    A new Fellowship status was launched at buildingSMART International’s Barcelona summit in April, recognising the voluntary contributions of 18 buildingSMART members and officers – past and mainly present – from around the world.

  • By Kari S. Borgos

    on

    ISO/TC 59 at WSBE17 Hong Kong

    ISO/TC 59 has been invited to be a supporting organisation to next year's World Sustainable Built Environment Conference, WSBE17, which is held in Hong Kong on 5-7 June 2017.

  • By Kari S. Borgos

    on

    ISO 19208 published

    Developed by SC 3, the recently published ISO 19208:2016 Framework for specifying performance in buildings provides the necessary framework and principles to describe the performance of a building as a whole or a part thereof.

  • By Kari S. Borgos

    on

    ISO/TC 59 Plenary Week 2016

    On 4 to 11 October, ISO/TC 59 meets in Berlin for its biennial plenary week. In addition to the TC level, seven of our nine subcommittees with their working groups come together for an intensive eight days of meetings.

  • By Lisbet Landfald

    on

    ISO 29481-1:2016 is published

    ISO 29481-1:2016 Building information models – Information delivery manual – Part 1: Methodology and format, was published on 1 May 2016. This is a revision of the first edition from 2010. The development has been done by WG 8, with Convenor Henk Schaap (NL) and Project Leader Jan Karlshøj (DK).

  • By Kari S. Borgos

    on

    Successful meeting week in Madrid

    On 5 October, ISO/TC 59's Advisory Group met at the offices of AENOR in Madrid. Five subcommittees and eight working groups also took the opportunity to meet in conjunction with the Advisory Group, among them the new subcommittee on construction procurement and the new working group on modular coordination.
     

  • By Kari S. Borgos

    on

    ISO/TC 59/WG 3 "Modular coordination" up and running

    This summer, ISO/TC 59 launched a ballot for the approval of convenor to the new ISO/TC 59/WG 3 "Modular coordination". The ballot also served as a call for experts to participate in the working group.

  • By Kari S. Borgos

    on

    Re-appointment of Chair

    Kjell Ivar Bakkmoen from Norway has been re-appointed as Chair of SC 13 "Organization of information about construction works" for another three years until the end of 2017.

  • By Kari S. Borgos

    on

    ISO & construction

    In 2012, ISO developed a brochure about standardisation in the field of construction and how this is dealt with in ISO and its committees.

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