Starting in about 1999, leading Building Automation professionals were early collaborators in the effort to put realtime data in service to better interior comfort and energy efficiency. They recognized their role as catalysts of this paradigm shift and set to work aligning all the necessary people, processes and technologies. Here's a timeline of their achievements. All the thought-leadership articles, commercial announcements, and press releases used to compile this timeline were found in the database of the online magazine automatedbuildings.com.
Navigation tips; use the timeline at the bottom to move through time. Push the 3d button in the left corner to fly though all the posts even faster. Each post includes a link to the full article.
Ken Sinclair reports on how Internet connectivity is set to change real estate, facilities management and the buildings automation and systems integration industry. This article was a first wake up call as to how significant coming change is going to be in the future.
Any building with a DDC system that has a computer workstation interface has all that is needed to begin using HyperText Markup Language (HTML) for Operations & Maintenance documentation. This article explores the advantages of making that change as soon as possible, introducing the concepts of linking, searching, remote access, mixing graphics and text, password security, etc.
Thomas Hartman explains how network-based control can improve HVAC energy efficiency and comfort performance in the variable speed era. With network control, you can set the speed of the device according to actual requirements of all the loads served rather than to meet a static pressure or temperature setpoint.
John Petze, currently with SkyFoundry and, at the time, VP Product Development with Andover Controls Corporation, wrote in March 2000 that “Ethernet running TCP/IP is the protocol to bet on for open systems going forward. In effect, Ethernet has become the new "utility."
Jim Butler and Keith Corbett of Cimetrics posit that BACnet and Java are complementary and they explore the use of Java for control systems. The article illustrates Java programs that communicate with BACnet devices. Java's technical challenges in this context are also evaluated.
Respected industry author John J. "Jack" McGowan provides a primer here for system integrators deciding between the BACnet™ and LonWorks™ system communication protocol standards. Now that the market has settled on these two DDC network standards, the opportunity to achieve open systems and to leverage off-the-shelf technology and the worldwide web is at hand. However, there is still the challenge of choosing between these communication options. The author recommends close consideration of interoperability goals. Interoperability can be viewed as a continuum with levels: Connecting, Sharing and Substituting.” The article explains these levels and emphasizes that HVAC specialists need to expand their scope when evaluating interoperability, taking into account the interoperability levels possible with equipment used for fire alarms, security, vertical transport, office automation, etc.
As reported by Ken Sinclair, the challenge of keeping up with all the new IT and Communications technologies impacting the job of the buildings automation/control system integration professional is confounding a percentage of the industry. automatedbuildings.com and Engineered Systems magazine committed to working toward freely providing educational content digitally. What they have to learn to understand today's Building Automation industry is written on a curve that appears as a wall layered with every control technology we have ever invented. Without reference to how we came to be here it is just that, a wall. The last layer may be the only chance we have of explaining ourselves. Information Technology or IT solutions abound and everyone must learn the power of browser-based presentation to move forward. The ability of browser-based media to allow us to move in multi directions rapidly at our own pace is the tool we need to analyze the information wall.
In May 2001, Ken assembled 11 trends that he saw were catalysts for the rapid evolution of large Buildings Automation. To provide more detail on those trends, he extracted and edited content from articles published on the AutomatedBuildings.com web site. The list presented in this article provides reference to each key article so if you wish more insight you can read the complete article.
This interview with Jim Henry, Founder and current chairman of the BACnet Interest Group – AustralAsia (BIG-AA), recounts high interest in the standard through the Asia-Pacific countries. Henry reports that in 1999, Alerton, Automated Logic, Delta, and Simplex cooperated to put on a full day forum on BACnet, at which both Mike Newman and Steve Bushby, (respectively, the then Chairman and Vice-Chairman of the BACnet committee) gave lectures. BIG-AA members followed up with lot of presentations to consultants and large clients. Recently, he made trips to Korea, Japan and China in response BACnet momentum there.
