In the UK generally, compliance with technical standards is achieved by compliance with Approved Document A of the Building Regulations which relates to 'structure'.
There are a list of references in Approved Document A which refer back to technical standards for each of the primary materials. (The British Standards, which will shortly be superceded by the Eurocode suite of Standards).
I dont know how this compares with IBC as I am not familiar with that code.
To add to valley boys comments...while both UK and US codes utilize a mixture of prescriptive and performance language to the best of my knowledge there are major differences.
Some points you should be aware of include:
1. Building regulations for England and Wales are the same but different for Scotland.
2. An explanatory booklet for building regulations in England and Wales can be downloaded from
design for progressive collapse(disproportionate collapse) is not a requirement in IBC but is in the building regulations of England/Wales..refer to A3/Section 5.
5. You will need different design and material standards. In Part A: Structure, the subject after disproportionate collapse is STANDARDS REFERRED TO. Compare this to chapter 35 of the IBC.. REFERENCED STANDARDS.
6. Check with the building control(building and safety) and planning departments of jurisdiction where project will be located for specific regulations.
valleyboy: Are MICEs typically permitted to offer structural design services for buildings or do they have to be MIStructE?
Currently, you dont have to hold any professional qualifications to carry out structural design in the UK. I believe that this is because the majority of design work is submmitted for Local Authority approval under the Building Regulations. There is a proposal which is currently being considered for self certification in Wales and England. (I think this system is currently in use in Scotland).
This will allow chartered civil and strucural engineers (CEng MICE and CEng MIStructE) to certify that their design work complies with approved document A without the need for checking.
Its a sad fact that small domestic electrical installation work needs to be certified by a qualified electrician, but anyone can carry out structural design work regardless of their experience or ability.
Thanks so much for the response. A couple more questions if you do not mind.
What qualifications are required for local authority personnel who review plans and caclulations...do they have to be chartered engineers? I have heard of individuals designated as building control survey inspectors...can they perform the review of structural calcs/drawings..and what of members of RIBA?
I worked in Building Control for eight years and checked lots of the simpler calculations - my qualification is as a Building Surveyor and at university I was probably the only student in my group who looked forward to the structural engineering classes. The key thing is to know the limit of your own competence. A key thing also is to be able to stand back from checking what has been submitted to see whether things that should have been checked have been: e.g. the steel beam may be fine, but what holds it up?
I am nervous of self-certification having seen that well qualified engineers can make mistakes. I once had to phone up someone who had been a visiting lecturer at my uni to say that a cantilever had been mis-scaled at 1m when it was actually 2m. His initial response was that he wasn't going to be told how to do structures by some untrained building inspector and put the phone down. An hour or so later he phoned up again, apologised, and thanked me for spotting what could have been a very serious error.
There are no prescribed qualification requirements in order to work as a checking engineer. My background was in private sector consultancy before I joined local government.
There are just three structural engineers employed by my Authority - two of us are Chareterd Engineers (I'm MICE, one of my colleagues MIStructE), and one is a graduate. We are fortunate as we dont just carry out checking duties - we also design all the new buildings constructed by the Authortity. Our Building Control Surveyors don't carry out any structural checking - it all comes to us.
Members of RIBA are generally employed in the architectural field and wouldn't normally carry out structural design work.
TonyUK - I share youe concern regarding self-certification. I have seen far graver mistakes than the example you quoted which I have picked up during checking. I agree that everyone makes mistakes (myself included - more often than I'd like to admit !) and the Building Control process is a useful third party check tool.
Since the introduction of the new Building (Scotland) Regulations, the term self certification is possibly a misnomer because you cannot certify your own design.
The certifying engineer must be independent of the design process. He must also be registered with the Scottish Building Standards Agency. To become registered you need to be vetteed and approved, and even if you are registered it does not mean you are legally allowed to certify a whole design. For instance, when you submit you may be able to demonstrate experience in steel and concrete design, but not in, say, timber or structural glass. In which case you cannot certify these aspects.
You will be responsible for certifying it, but you need to arrange for the other aspeces to be checked by someone else.
I believe this is causing a few headaches for the Sole Practioners in Scotland because they need to get an independent check/certification done on their design (bar a few very limited exceptions).
You can still go the old route of submitting all calculations to Building Control and letting them check them on your behalf. That process takes a lot longer though.
I agree a third party check is useful, but ultimately someone has to pay for it. As a client would you like to pay for something to be checked twice, three times even. Would you not begin to question the competency of your designer?
I would like to ask the question, in England, someone designs it, then someone checks it, then building control check it again. How many checks do we think we actually need to ensure something is correct? We are only human and I imagine mistakes have made it through Building Control in the past.
Please dont misconstrue this as 'stirring' as I am just trying to guage opinion.
I take your point regarding checking and re-checking of calculations - and I agree that three or four checks are un-necessary.
I think that the Building Control check is particularly useful perhaps where no checking has been carried out prior to submission for Building Regulations approval.
I have never seen anyone put something to Building Control unchecked, but I can believe it happens. IMHO nothing should leave a design office for issue to an external third party unless it has been checked and reviewed. The risks associated with that sort or practice are enormous.
Maybe I am being naive and blinkered living in my own little world
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