Opinion

ARE SMART BUILDINGS COST EFFICIENT?

Charlie Hilton, Head of Sauter Energy, Sauter Automation Ltd

Before we tackle the question “Are Smart Buildings Cost Efficient?” we need to frame the situation as it currently stands: buildings account for nearly 40% of all global greenhouse gas emissions. Approximately 70% comes from building operations with the remainder from construction.

In 2015, the world saw the inception of the Paris Agreement whereby 196 parties agreed upon a global long-term temperature goal to 1.5⁰C above pre-industrial levels. In April 2021, the UK Government set one of the world’s most ambitious climate change targets and committed the country to cutting emissions by 78% by 2035 compared to 1990 levels.

Legislation and carbon reporting is becoming more prevalent. Landlords, tenants, real estate investors across all sectors and industries have had to become acutely aware of their scope 1-3 carbon emissions. Back in 2019, the Streamlined Energy and Carbon Reporting (SECR) was implemented which affects companies, LLPS and groups that exceed two of three threshold criteria;

• Annual turnover of £36m

• Total balance sheet of £18m

• At least 250 employees

As of January 2022 it is now a mandatory requirement to include Climate-related Financial Disclosure within SECR, including details of how climate-related risks are identified and subsequently managed. These risks are expected to be analysed and key performance indicators (KPIs) put in place to mitigate these to be reported on FY 2023.

All this to say that there is a responsibility on businesses, building owners, managers, and the construction industry to reduce their energy by retrofitting existing building stock while ensuring new builds utilise low carbon materials and smart technologies.

WHAT IS A “SMART BUILDING”?

A smart building is made up of connected advanced controls system that regulates the buildings key operations such as; heating, ventilation, air conditioning, lighting, smart shading, room booking systems lifts, utilising a multitude of sensors and actuators. All systems are connected via cloud servers collecting and storing data to provide an optimal environment whilst meeting desired energy and carbon consumption. The optimal environment will be different for all building types and industries.

Smart buildings range from Connected to Autonomous:

• Connected: refers to traditional building automation “head end” hosted on SCADA servers connecting the individual controllers, sensors, actuators and other devices.

• Autonomous Building: where a building will have the ability to interrogate itself, analyse, diagnose, and take proactive actions to resolve problems. The building will be capable of endto-end interaction – as planned preventative maintenance including scheduling, booking, enabling access and commissioning of replaced components then selfreconfiguration using digital twin models which are held within cloud-based servers The global smart building market is projected to grow from circa £67 billion in 2022 to over £270 billion by 2029 (Mordor Intelligence). The worldwide issue of global warming and concerns over energy consumption is fuelling the market for more energy efficient solutions and technologies.

ARE SMART BUILDINGS COST EFFICIENT?

We have seen the unprecedented rise in wholesale energy prices in 2022. Factors include geopolitical unrest following the invasion of Ukraine, supply issues with LNG (liquid natural gas) and unseasonably high temperatures. Having connected smart systems within a building will inevitably provide a higher degree of control and efficiency for HVAC and lighting systems (which affect more than 70% of a buildings energy use) and deliver cost savings. Data is a key component to a smart building. The smart building can automatically adjust to the changes in environment in a dynamic way by using sensors to measure and monitor key variable data. Examples include occupancy, air quality, outside air temperature and lighting levels. A smart building provides a higher degree of opportunities to enhance, optimise the control building.

In conjunction with the direct savings on emissions, smart buildings incorporate sensor data to monitor performance of critical plant. The system can alert relevant staff to when machinery falls outside of its expected parameters, allowing issues to be addressed in a timely manner, improving asset longevity and sustainability metrics. With assets being monitored remotely, maintenance can be managed more effectively, or remote resolution can be implemented which reduces scope 3 carbon emissions from a business’s supply chain. The building uptime is increased, and the lifecycle costs reduced significantly just by harnessing the available data. Using the latest data analytic algorithms such as data patterns, operational discrepancies can be identified and alerted before they become a problem. Thus, maintaining a continuous healthy working environment and limiting the possibility of wasted energy.

As technology moves forward quickly, there are an abundance of IoT (Internet of Things) wireless sensors and IoT smart devices that can integrate and work harmoniously together within the smart building space. Wireless technology simplifies and reduces installation time and costs by not requiring the same amount of physical hardware.

Arguably the most important commodity a business has is their workforce. As we migrate back to higher office occupancy following the pandemic, analytical data can provide real time understanding of potentially overcrowded zones and guide staff to less populated areas to maintain air quality. Occupancy sensors for desk and meeting rooms can inform cleaning regimes as well as providing control to connected services, such as lighting and cooling. The smart building is designed to increase user comfort and deliver enhanced wellbeing through productive working environments.

Ultimately cost is still a consideration, but every smart building solution is intended to be flexible and tailored to suit ongoing improvements to a building services and operational efficiencies. www.sauterautomation.co.uk