Part 2: Commissioning Is Now a Lifetime Discipline

In the first part of this series, focused on reflections from a commissioning themed panel discussion I moderated, I explained why commissioning can no longer be treated as a late-stage activity. The scale, complexity and pace of modern data centre delivery have made that position increasingly difficult to defend. Commissioning now influences design decisions, energisation strategy, operational safety and programme outcomes long before a facility is ready to go live.

But there is another assumption the industry continues to hold that deserves equal scrutiny.

We still tend to treat handover as the finish line.

Once construction is complete, systems have been tested, documentation has been issued and the facility has been energised, the project is considered finished. Responsibility passes to operations and the commissioning team moves on. For years, that model was accepted as normal.

This model no longer makes sense. 

Complete is not the same as proven

If there is one line I would want the industry to internalise, it is that. A building can be complete and not be proven. Complete is a construction status. Proven is an assurance status, and only one of them tells you the facility will do what it was designed to do when it is carrying a live load. 

The gap between the two is exactly where disputes, late surprises and operational risk live, and it is invisible right up until the moment it is not. The standard for what a commissioning evidence pack must contain has risen sharply, and rightly so. Clients are no longer accepting a building that looks complete in favour of one that is demonstrably operationally usable. They are buying proof, not appearance, and the evidence pack is where that distinction is either honoured or exposed. More than that, the discipline does not stop at handover. 

Commissioning and verification have historically been treated as a CAPEX activity, something you fund to get the building proven and signed off and then move on from. That made sense when commissioning was a single point in time. It makes far less sense now. As facilities become more data-driven and performance-led, the logic of commissioning extends into operation, through continuous validation, ongoing assurance, and proof of efficiency and resilience long after the project itself has closed. 

That is the shift I expect to define the next few years: commissioning moving from a purely CAPEX activity into an OPEX one as well. To be clear, the facility is not abandoned at handover. There are operations teams and facilities management in place from day one. What typically stops is the independent third-party verification. The CxA proves the building, signs it off, and walks away, and no one comes back to verify that the ongoing testing and maintenance are actually holding the facility to the standard it was handed over at. 

That is the gap, and it is worth saying that other large, safety-critical industries closed it a long time ago. In sectors like aviation, nuclear, oil and gas and pharmaceuticals, independent verification of an asset through its operational life is simply how things are done, not an optional extra. The data centre market is still catching up to that thinking. It makes complete sense for operators to keep the CxA who signed the building off engaged beyond handover to continue verifying it throughout its operational life, rather than treating sign-off as the end of the relationship. 

The clients who recognise that and treat assurance as something that continues to earn its place throughout the asset's operational life will get the best outcomes from the capital they have committed.

None of this works without people

It would be dishonest to talk about scaling commissioning without acknowledging the underlying constraint. The industry is short of commissioning professionals and specialists at exactly the moment demand is accelerating. End users are hiring from OEMs, contractors and CxA businesses, which is a vote of confidence in the discipline but also a drain on the businesses expected to deliver it. And the prevailing delivery model still leans heavily on long hours, sustained site presence, and large specialist teams under intense pressure. We should be asking openly whether that model is sustainable as projects continue to scale, because fatigue in a live environment is itself a safety risk.

Building long-term capability, through employed teams and genuine career structure rather than a freelance-by-default culture, is not a cost to be minimised. It is what allows assurance to be delivered consistently across regions and across a growing portfolio of work. You cannot deliver consistent assurance with an inconsistent workforce.

None of this is delivered in isolation

The last theme, and the one that tied the panel together, was collaboration. It was no accident that the room housed the design, the OEM, the main contractor, the commissioning authority, and the client. The questions we are facing do not fit cleanly into any of those seats, and they cannot be solved in any of them either. 

If we are going to deliver at this scale, collaboration is more important than ever. The boundaries between disciplines are exactly where risk accumulates when those parties work in sequence rather than together. I welcome that, and I am open to it. The businesses that will deliver well over the next few years are the ones willing to share information earlier, challenge each other honestly, and accept that assurance is a shared responsibility rather than a baton passed down the line. That is the posture I want our business to be known for, and it is the conversation I want to keep having with the people we build alongside.

Where this leaves us

If I had to compress the panel into a single line, it would be this. The industry is being asked to deliver significantly more capacity, with far greater complexity, on timelines that have not expanded at the same pace, and it is still relying on the methods it has used for the last decade. The old sequence of build first and prove later does not survive contact with that reality. Nor does the assumption that a complete building is proven.

What was clear from the panel, and from the work I see across our projects, is that the industry is already moving toward a more strategic commissioning philosophy and a stronger governance model, better suited to today's hyperscale, phased developments. That direction of travel is the right one. The task now is to make it the standard rather than the exception, and to do so at the pace the market demands.

Commissioning is not about proving equipment works at the end of construction. It is about proving that a facility can operate safely, reliably, efficiently, and as intended in the real world. Treating it as a lifecycle discipline, embedded from design through to operation, is no longer the sophisticated option. On the projects being built now, it is the only one that holds.

My thanks to the panel for an honest discussion. The industry won't change by getting comfortable. It changes when people are willing to ask harder questions than the ones we've settled for, to challenge the methods we've leaned on for decades, and to hold themselves to a higher standard than the one the market currently demands. We are building the infrastructure that the next era will run on. It deserves a commissioning discipline that matches its ambition. That work starts with the questions we're prepared to keep asking, and the honesty to act on the answers.