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> Article Feb. 2003
BACnet Remote
Monitoring And The Bottom Line
By Jim Lee and Jason
Griffith, Cimetrics
For years, the number of facilities
equipped with building automation and control has been
growing rapidly. However, most facility managers have
only been able to derive partial value from this investment.
While these systems have certainly provided an adequate
level of equipment and environmental control, their
potential to provide effective energy management has
not been fully realized.
Over time, control systems
produce literally terabytes of valuable data on operating
metrics, energy consumption patterns, and mechanical
drift. However, this data is almost always disregarded
for two reasons: First, data from different control
system manufacturers has not been interchangeable and
hence, analyzing data from a portfolio of properties
in different formats has been cost prohibitive. Second,
it makes little economic sense to store and analyze
this data locally (facility staff typically lacks the
time and resources for such analysis), and there has
been no effective means of transporting this data off-site
to be cataloged and mined for value.
BACnet Advantages
Things have changed. In 1995,
the major manufacturers of building automation products
agreed upon a common set of data definitions called
BACnet, which has become an ASHRAE standard and a European
pre-standard. Today, four out of every five new control
systems have the ability to "speak" BACnet.
One of the most significant
capabilities of BACnet is its ability to take data from
disparate control systems, make it "look" the same,
and analyze the material from a single set of tools.
In addition, the advent of
the Internet and broadband infrastructures has made
the off-site transportation of large amounts of data
for machine to machine analysis cost effective. Facility
managers who specify BACnet native controls enjoy the
freedom from restrictive service agreements as their
controls can be serviced by any BACnet ready vendor.
The New Kids On The Block
In the last year and a half,
a remote monitoring, analysis, and reporting process-often
termed Cybernetic Building Systems (CBS) or Networked
Building Systems (NBS)-has moved rapidly onto the scene.
The systems are taking full advantage of these trends
and enabling facility managers to realize the potential
of their building control purchase.
The CBS/NBS process is the
aggregation and transport of mechanical data from a
facility's control system to an offsite location where
it is analyzed by a set of software tools. These analysis
algorithms look for operating inefficiencies in mechanical
cycles, pinpoint mechanical failures before they occur,
and target opportunities to save energy dollars while
increasing occupant comfort.
The remote monitoring and data
mining process results in periodic reports containing
specific recommendations for facility managers to adjust
and tune their equipment accordingly.
This new paradigm in remote
analysis and reporting serves to supplement the powerful
features included in leading control systems. For example,
control systems are designed to alert users to alarm
conditions or failure points of equipment components,
yet no one has taken it to the next level-until now.
CBS/NBS provides facility managers
with the capability to identify small levels of equipment
drift from manufacturers' specifications that result
in unnecessary energy consumption and lead to eventual
alarm conditions. Secondly, the vast majority of building
automation systems disregard data after 24 hours. Hence,
they are very effective in identifying a resultant condition
of energy inefficiencies yet are unable to pinpoint
the underlying causes. CBS/NBS, on the other hand, stores
and analyzes years of data and identifies energy loss
at the terminal level where it most often occurs.
Critical Service
From a facility manager's perspective,
next generation BACnet based analysis and reporting
should not be viewed as an outsourcing of core facility
manager functions, but rather as a critical yet auxiliary
service that enables staff to "turbo charge" their controls.
Day-to-day operation of controls
is left entirely to facility staff while raw data that
would otherwise be left on the shop room floor is compiled
by the CBS/NBS partner and processed into key action
items, alerting staff to correctable mechanical anomalies
months before an alarm condition would normally occur.
CBS/NBS is not another computer
program for an already overburdened maintenance staff
to use. Rather, it is a time and money saving tool that
enables facility managers to do more with less and prioritize
an ever growing list of critical maintenance and repair
tasks.
As the installation of new
controls involves the set up and calibration of thousands
of internal programs that are all highly prone to conflict,
CBS/NBS can untangle these software glitches, ensuring
controls are set up properly and preventing new equipment
purchases from degrading before they reach failure point.
An independent survey on the
CBS/NBS process by the National Institute of Standards
(1999 NIS TIR 6303) determined that NBS can save as
much as 39¢ to 75¢ per square foot per year in energy,
maintenance, repair, operations, and occupant productivity
savings. The process has been likened to "ongoing commissioning"
or the continual optimization of buildings equipment
systems through systematic data analysis.
Through its data mining, analysis,
and reporting capabilities, CBS/NBS brings to the table
its ability to facilitate predictive maintenance-as
opposed to reactive maintenance-especially in the face
of an increasingly serious national energy situation.
Not only does remote monitoring
of mechanical systems with BACnet data save bottom line
dollars by reducing overall energy consumption, but
it also gets properties "deregulation-ready." By gaining
an in depth understanding of energy demand at the equipment,
system, and building levels, facility managers can better
negotiate with utility companies and take advantage
or real-time pricing opportunities in the future.
Benefits of BACnet-based
CBS/NBS:
- 39¢ to 75¢ per square foot
per year savings in energy, maintenance, repair, and
operational costs according to a 1999 National Institute
of Standards study;
- Data analysis enables predictive
maintenance, responding to equipment failures before
they occur; extending the life of capital assets;
- Independent third party
analysis enables owners to evaluate performance claims
by contractors and manufacturers accurately;
- Continuous monitoring ensures
that mechanical system performance won't degrade after
an upgrade or repair is made;
- The system's superior commissioning
for new construction and "continuous commissioning"
for existing facilities; and
- Lastly, CBS/NBS maintains
a consistent, single set of information in spite of
changing contractors, vendors, and personnel.
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