Commercial buildings account for 40% of global energy consumption. 60-70 % of that goes toward air conditioning system of the building. Inefficient operations can easily account for 20-30% of total energy waste. If we can eliminate 20-30% of energy waste, we will be able to reduce global energy consumption by 10%.
When it comes to hotels, the energy consumption is even higher. Here are some of the specific reasons behind energy wastage in hotels:
● Installation of inefficient assets and equipment (cold rooms, chillers, etc.)
● Critical equipment operating at suboptimal set point
● Manual asset management
● Lack of visibility into the building operations
The challenges of automating operations with a building management system (BMS)
Most property managers, owners, and tenants agree that BMS works well. However, it’s not a reality. In fact, it comes with a lot of challenges, especially when it comes to driving automation in buildings.
Here are the below-listed reasons for it:
● Suitable only for large buildings
In developed economies like India, only 2% of buildings with less than 50k square feet area can afford BMS. Small buildings also consume energy at a high percentage. If they are not able to deploy BMS, they can’t monitor the assets of their building.
● Dependent on wired communication
BMS is a largely wired system that is difficult to install and maintain. Achieving energy efficiency goals becomes challenging this way.
● High upfront CAPEX
A BMS installation in a building incurs a significant upfront CAPEX cost. A proper ROI is extremely difficult to achieve.
● Mostly on-premise deployment
It leads to the lack of centralized visibility into the building operations. Automation can’t be achieved with these loopholes.
● Maintenance of the system is difficult
There is a lack of visibility into malfunctioning components. It requires expensive and skilled manpower for the installation and service of these systems.
BMS is not sufficient for maintaining energy efficiency in hotels. It is time to leverage advanced technology. There is a need for an IoT-based building automation system.
IoT enabled energy efficiency in hotels
Connectivity is the future! Thankfully, the internet of things (IoT) came into existence. Coming with a network of interconnected devices, controllers, and systems, it drives automation in the building environment. The relationship between IoT and energy efficiency is a key to creating connected buildings.
Understand how can hotels achieve energy efficiency with the implementation of IoT technology:
1) Data-driven centralized asset management
1. Deployment of IoT sensors:
● Energy meters
● Temperature and humidity
● Equipment (e.g. valve, VFD) status
● Pressures and flow sensors
● Integration with the existing BMS, etc.
2. Identification of equipment anomalies using AI/ML on the collected data
3. Creation and closure of tickets for the identified anomalies
2) Automated control of assets
HVAC systems account for higher energy consumption in buildings. IoT-based BMS allows for automated control of HVAC in the following manner:
● Low side
1. Modulating chilled water valves
2. Scheduling & duty cycling of AHUs
3. Modulating VFDs of AHU
● High Side
1. Modulating LWT/RWT
2. Controlling the VFD of the secondary pump
3. Controlling VFD of condenser pump
Energy efficiency is driven by automation. The powerful IoT technology makes it possible.
IoT based BMS
IoT architecture includes sensors, actuators, cloud-based software, and communication protocols that are layered and controlled by a central building management system (BMS). Ultimately, it helps optimize systems, allowing them to communicate with each other collaboratively.
The IoT structure consists of:
● Web dashboard app
● Analytics engine
● IoT Gateways for the internet connectivity at each node
● Smart IO interface
● Field devices level
Achieving the energy efficiency goals just becomes proactive with the IoT-based BMS.
Why choose IoT when BMS is an option?
Most hotels still rely on BMS. It does collect all the data but it goes into the computer-based system. With IoT, the data directly goes into the cloud, allowing facility managers to get real-time insights into the building operations. As a result, hotels can get centralized visibility to the systems with IoT technology.
The powerful IoT-based BMS system offers these benefits over traditional BMS:
● Comes with the connected systems that provide visibility across sites
● Establishes correlation with business metrics
● 40-60% cost-effective – hardware light, software rich
● Easy to deploy as it is battery-powered, wireless technology
● Conditioning monitoring driven maintenance rather than time-based maintenance
With IoT, hotels can achieve a lot more than a BMS at 50% of the cost.
Key architectural differences between BMS & IoT
IoT will always have an upper hand over BMS. Analyze these key architectural to get better insights:
1. Control layer
BMS – It relies on manual management. Facility managers do the set points and alarm management
IoT – It purely works on algorithms to ensure adaptive and intelligent control
2. Data and analytics
BMS – All data goes to the local computer in the facility
IoT – Works on cloud-based analytics that leads to actionable insights
3. Central controller
BMS – Everything comes together in the BACnet controller
IoT – There are multiple IoT gateways, each independently managing different zones
4. Chilled water systems
BMS – Chiller plant manager (CPM) wired to a BACnet controller
IoT – Direct integration with CPM or wireless card acting as CPM
5. Pumping equipment
BMS – DDC wired to BACnet controller
IoT – Wireless I/O card with edge intelligence
6. Low side control
BMS – DDC wired to BACnet controller
IoT – Wireless I/O card with edge intelligence
7. Ambient sensing
BMS – This setting is not available in BMS
IoT – Battery-powered wireless sensors
Leverage IoT-based BMS technology to ensure energy efficiency in hotels
Energy efficiency is one of the benefits of incorporating IoT into commercial buildings. To ensure the optimal energy management system, connect with Zenatix. With our powerful IoT solutions, we make sure your facility operates at the efficient levels for maximum energy savings.
View Source : https://www.zenatix.com/iot-based-bms-for-energy-efficiency-in-hotels-2/
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