The development and experiences on certification procedure of building thermographers

The certification procedure for building thermographers in Finland was launched 2003. After 14 years training courses the interpretation and reporting procedures have been renewed and modernized, also the new requirements have been now accepted for building thermographers. The normal procedure of building thermography is two-stage thermography in connection of air-tightness test and now first time there was a pilot course combining the air-tightness and building thermography certification. In this presentation some updated requirements for building thermographers are introduced, also typical deficiencies and errors what the thermographers do. Because European Union's Energy Performance of Buildings Directive came into the force in the member states, it caused lot of changes in Building Codes in Finland, and now the role of building codes will be changed, too. This has caused the generalization of building thermography during the last 10-15 years, and this development also raised the certification of building thermographers. Aerial thermography using drones has grown rapidly. Other wavelengths can be combined with thermography, like hyperspectral imaging and of course normal visual imaging. There are no guidelines dealing with the use of drones and aerial thermography for various applications. This paper also briefly discusses the challenges of drones based on Finnish experiences.