Standards Development

Scope

This document provides guidance on selection, installation, use and maintenance of auxiliary systems and equipment as well as best management practises for hardened protective shelters (further referred to as “shelters”).

This document does not address shelter protective equipment and systems, which are presented in ISO/TS 22359-2.

The document is intended for use by the owners of the hardened protective shelters, architects and engineers designing them, industry producing the targeted equipment, and procurement organisations in construction industry sourcing such equipment.

Purpose

Market need for a new Technical Specification:

The proposed ISO Technical Specification is a logical continuation for the ISO 22359 series of documents addressing the design, use, construction and maintenance of hardened protective shelters; consisting of ISO 22359:2024 and ISO/TS 22359-2 (expected to be published early 2026).

ISO 22359 provides general guidelines, which helps planning shelter programmes, adds to the quality of shelter designs and helps maintaining a shelter but it does not describe best practices for the management of a shelter. ISO/TS 22359-2 contains precise and detailed requirements and specifications for protective systems and equipment for a shelter, but it does not address other systems and equipment (such as sanitation, heating and ventilation) nor best practises for management of important functions (such as people management, cleaning and medical care) of a shelter, which are also necessary.

The public administrations and other organisations building and utilising shelters to protect their citizens or employees cannot depend on ISO 22359 and ISO/TS 22359-2 alone. These developers need to have a certainty that a shelter not only provides protection against threats but is designed and built to offer a sufficient level of habitability, care and comfort to the sheltered people.

A shelter must also be managed so that all important functions are completed on time. Therefore, a shelter needs various auxiliary systems and equipment (such as ventilation and heating systems) to ensure the provision of suitable conditions as well as a wide variety of supplies and materials (such as water and food) for use by the sheltered people. The supply side (the industry supplying auxiliary systems and equipment for shelters) requires guidance on the required equipment to be offered to their customers.

Various expert organisations (e.g. architects and design engineers) offering design or consultation services to the supply or demand sides also need detailed recommendations to help them specify the most suitable solutions for the systems and functions required for provision of suitable living conditions. Same applies also to the procurement personnel of the construction industry who need to have detailed specifications for the equipment to be purchased and ways of constructing the shelter.

Therefore, there is a perceived need for an international Technical Specification that would complete the ISO 22359 series by providing recommendations for the above mentioned expectations. This would greatly benefit all parties involved in the process of planning, designing, construction and maintenance of hardened protective shelters by setting clear criteria that the customers should demand, and all suppliers of auxiliary systems and equipment should meet with.

Type of standardisation deliverable:

Under normal circumstances, the natural and recommended approach would be to start drafting an international standard to address the issues experienced by the above-mentioned stakeholders. However, the demand for shelters is globally growing due to the rapidly tightening geopolitical situation.

The governments of many countries globally are activating shelter building programmes for protection of civilians in case the conflicts would break out into open armed hostilities. The market needs a document for the specification and selection of auxiliary systems and equipment as well as for planning of management practices in the near future, and the completion time of an international standard is too long. Therefore, this proposed new work item aims at a Technical Specification, which then later can be upgraded to a full standard.

Relevance to standardization by ISO/TC 292:

In general, the proposed TS would match the basic values of standardization: it would help the involved stakeholders to do their work better, it would contribute to higher and uniform quality of products, processes and systems, it would contribute to decreasing costs, it would reduce barriers on global markets, and finally, it would contribute to increasing the level of citizen security during emergencies and disasters.

The proposed TS would fit extremely well in the scope of ISO/TC 292 (“Standardization in the field of security to enhance the safety and resilience of society”). The stakeholders involved in the drafting of the standard represent organizations already participating in the work of the Committee.

The proposed TS matches the Strategic Business Plan of ISO/TC 292 in several ways. It falls in the described Business Environment of the Committee and addresses many of the political, economic, technical, regulatory and social trends described in Sect. 2 of the strategy.

It also supports the expected benefits defined in Sect. 3 of the strategy as well as the objectives and strategies defined in Sect. 5 of the strategy. The natural development environment for the new TS would be ISO/TC 292/WG 10 “Preparedness”, as the WG already has developed ISO 22359 and ISO/TS 22359-2. There is a common willingness amongst the WG members to continue the group’s work through the proposed new TS.