The Building Engineering Services Association (BESA) has announced its 2026 Industry Awards shortlist which places a special emphasis on youth education this year.
The awards, which comprise 21 categories, reward individuals, teams, and companies responsible for delivering projects, products, innovations, and initiatives that demonstrate excellence in all aspects of building services engineering.
The winners will be announced at a glittering BESA Awards dinner at the historic Brewery, Chiswell Street, London on October 22 following the Association’s Annual Conference at the same venue earlier in the day.
The headline sponsor of the gala event is Mitsubishi Electric and the dinner is also being supported by several individual category sponsors.
There are awards for outstanding projects and firms as well as individuals who have gone above and beyond the call of duty for the greater good of the industry. Categories cover the full supply chain from manufacturers and distributors though contractors, engineers, and clients, and they reflect the industry’s efforts to get to grips with today’s big issues like competence and compliance, building safety, and decarbonisation.
This year, as well as BESA’s long-standing apprentice categories covering specialist trades like refrigeration and air conditioning, and facilities and energy management, the Awards have added a new overall Trainee of the Year Award sponsored by Milwaukee.
Exceptional
This was created to recognise exceptional young achievers from all parts of the sector while also reflecting fast changing routes to entry and competence development in an evolving industry.
The highly sought after Rising Star Award sponsored by Mikroper is also up for grabs again celebrating exceptional young talent from across the building engineering sector.
In another new development, BESA is offering ‘travel bursaries’ for apprentices and young engineers to help them attend the Conference and Awards thanks to the generous support of the Manly Trust.
The finalists in the 2026 WorldSkills UK competition (Refrigeration, Air Conditioning and Heat Pump category) sponsored by BAXI will also be honoured at this year’s awards dinner. BESA is the organising partner of the competition, which celebrates both emerging and existing technical skills.
“With all the talk about a ‘lost generation’ of young people struggling to find work in the UK, we felt our best contribution would be to put even more impressive young workers in the spotlight and celebrate their achievements,” said BESA’s senior group events and partnership manager Charlie Ward.
“BESA has a long tradition of celebrating the best and brightest talent, but we want to do even more this year by helping to showcase careers and opportunities that might otherwise go under the radar. We are also hugely grateful to the Manly Trust whose support will mean more young people can travel to the Conference and Awards this year.”
The full shortlist of finalists and category sponsors for BESA’s Industry Awards 2026 can be found online here and you can book your places at what is expected to be the Association’s largest ever awards dinner here.
Places at the Association’s Annual Conference are also selling fast but can still be found here.