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WOLVERHAMPTON HOMES ENGAGE HOMELINK FOR IOT INTEGRATION Wolverhampton Homes engaged HomeLINK and Northgate Public Services (NPS) with the aim of exploring how new Internet of Things (IoT) technologies could help in achieving a number of its objectives.
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ltimately, the aim of the project was to understand whether IoT enabled devices could help Wolverhampton Homes deliver social value whilst generating a return on investment. This would be achieved by providing a more holistic view of property conditions to enable a more proactive approach to property maintenance and the ability to make more data-driven investment decisions. With an ambition to push the frontiers of innovation in social housing technology, the company also wanted to explore data integration into its in-house IT systems and the impact of providing residents with IoT health and maintenance data. The following objectives were agreed at the outset:
HomeLINK’s Resident App
• Install a range of cutting-edge IoT sensors across six properties: • Environment sensors to measure temperature, humidity and CO2 • Aico SmartLINK Gateways, Multi-Sensor alarms and Carbon Monoxide (CO) alarms • Electricity smart meters • Empower residents with the data via monthly reports and workshops • Quantify health and maintenance outcomes • Integrate data, insights and alerts to NPS
“Some of the stock in our portfolio is quite old and we wanted to find out how IoT could give us a ‘big picture view’ of the condition of our properties,” said Linda Riding, Systems Development and Support Manager at Wolverhampton Homes. “For example, we knew that damp and mould were a problem in some properties, but we suspected that, in around 50% of cases, the problems could be reduced by people doing things differently in their homes. We wanted to use IoT to help us see how a change in tenants’ behaviour might not only reduce their household costs but also have a positive impact on the condition of our stock.” A major theme in this project was collaboration between Wolverhampton Homes, its residents and technology providers, such as HomeLINK, Aico and NPS. HomeLINK worked closely with NPS and Wolverhampton Homes to understand the end user requirements of integration into its property management system. The end result was the integration of alerts and insights generated by the HomeLINK platform to NPS Task Manager, using a series of Application Programmable Interfaces (APIs). This enabled Wolverhampton Homes users to see the following alerts in their Northgate property management system: • Smoke and CO alerts and maintenance events • Fuel poverty risk • Condensation, damp and mould risk HomeLINK also worked closely with resident pilot participants and held a series of workshops over the five-month period, as well as providing detailed breakdowns of their data and insights via bespoke monthly reports. During the group workshops, residents were presented with information on the current health of their home, alongside recommendations and actions they could carry out to make improvements. The results of this project were striking. The following are some highlighted results from the six properties over a five-month period:
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• 8% average reduction in electricity usage, despite one third of participants being very energy saving conscious from the outset. This translated to: • £23 total savings in electricity usage per resident • Reduction of 70kg CO2 per resident • 19% improvement in ventilation, leading to better respiratory health and maintenance outcomes. • Reduced behavioural mould risk across all homes, including one previously reported ‘high risk’ home reducing to a ‘low risk by the end of the project. All homes were considered low risk by the end of the project. Homes were evaluated by how energy efficient they were, and optimal homes were identified to target energy efficiency investment. A high priority maintenance alert for a smoke alarm in one property was triggered in NPS Task Manager as the resident had disconnected the alarm. The mould risk and air quality data helped identify a structural cause of mould. One resident, who had healthy indoor conditions, reported a sudden case of black mould. The data suggested it was not behavioural and further investigation highlighted leaking guttering causing water ingress. By installing the devices, integrating alerts into Northgate Task Manager, and providing residents with insights and recommendations, the partners were able to meet the goals of this project. The most encouraging finding of the project was how empowering residents with their IoT data can have a significant impact on health and maintenance outcomes and, ultimately, return on investment. This result led HomeLINK to develop a ‘Resident App’ with the objective of scaling the results from monthly reports and workshops as seen in this pilot study. The Resident App is currently in the beta testing phase with Wolverhampton Homes residents. Aico, aico.co.uk
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25/02/2021 16:03
