As part of building automation optimization, it is imperative that the personal involved should be well versed with system design in order to understand the original design intent, controls and also a qualified testing and balance team needs to be on board that fully understands the testing, adjustment, and balancing of variable volume systems. Being an integrated service provider with licensed professional engineers who have over 25 years of design experience in HVAC systems and having an in house testing and balancing team, you do not need to look elsewhere.

It gives you the biggest bang for your buck as explained below:

Today, building owners, managers and operators are being asked to improve the performance of their assets by lowering operating costs, improving tenant satisfaction and implementing sustainability efforts while being good stewards of the environment. They are being asked to do this in an economic climate that offers limited, or no access to capital for improvements, and with limited staff and systems capabilities.

Central plant equipment can present great opportunities for generating energy savings, not only in the plant, but also in the connected buildings as well as improve comfort conditions of building occupants.

Commercial buildings can realize numerous benefits from installing a building automation system (BAS), including improved facility performance and efficiency, optimized occupant comfort and easier day-to-day operation and control of the building and its system.

BAS provides the ability to integrate multiple building systems such as heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC), lighting and security, so they can be controlled by one single interface for greater efficiency and optimized performance.

Ensuring that a BAS is optimized for a specific building and application — and that it continues to stay optimized after installation — is key to getting the most out of the investment.

BAS which should be optimized at installation can lose effectiveness over time if it isn’t properly maintained. One of the most common issues that can hamper efficient building performance is overrides that veer from the original set points and design intent of the building and systems. People may not realize the impact that one simple override can have on the entire building or system. Sensors can wear over time and eventually fail leading to system operation veering from design intent. High energy bills and increased occupant complaints about abnormal temperatures are both good indicators that a BAS may not be performing optimally.

Fortunately, it’s typically easy to remedy issues that stem from overrides and sensors by carrying building automation optimization on a regular basis.

Building automation optimization process makes you aware of the common issues that can arise with building automation and helps to identify these issues that are affecting the efficiency of the system. Fixing these issues as part of the building automation optimization process reduces operating costs and occupant complaints and also ensures more efficient management of building systems and optimized performance over the life of the system..

There are varying levels of optimization which depend on the size of the building and equipment, operating budgets and staff, and limited construction costs. The most basic optimized plant can establish temperature resets, pump speed resets, etc. The level of optimization can extend to monitoring chiller refrigerant pressures and retrieving information such as kW and valve positions from all building loads regardless of the level of the initial optimized control sequences. This exercise allows for closer setback reset of parameters like chilled water supply temperature and supply air temperature improving on extended economizer run time and higher chiller plant COP, thus ensuring greater system efficiency and a lower carbon footprint.