Smarter BY DESIGN

Feb 1, 2008 12:00 PM, By Michael Fickes

Afire alarm activates on the third floor of a 36-floor high-rise downtown. Digital signage throughout the building displays alert messages followed by instructions tailored to each floor of the building. On certain floors, the instructions ask employees to leave the floor. Exit signs flash. The access control system unlocks doors as necessary. The elevators return to the lobby and disengage. Fire dampers open. The ventilation system in the area of the fire sucks the smoke out of hallways and offices.

The public address system issues alerts. Pages go out to security guards instructing them to help on the floors requiring evacuation. Throughout the building, cameras turn on and look for problems that intelligent video software applications have been programmed to detect. Within about 15 minutes, the access control system sends a memo to the security director itemizing how many people have left the affected floor and how many remain.

The security director gives the list to the fire chief, who has just arrived in response to a message generated and sent by the fire alarm system. The fire chief dispatches teams to battle the fire and to bring out the people who didn't make it off the floor. About 90 minutes after the fire alarm went off, the crisis ends. No injuries.

Today, technology can transform conventional building operations. Most importantly, smart building systems can combine forces to keep people safe in a crisis. These systems can also save large sums of money on energy costs by sensing and responding to events occurring inside of buildings.

Smart buildings are spreading around the world. This year in China, the Shanghai World Financial Centre, one of the world's tallest and smartest buildings, will open its doors. According to a white paper entitled “Technology Contracting: Designing Systems for Efficiency and Interoperability” from Milwaukee-based Johnson Controls Inc., systems installed in the building will include building management, wireless distribution, closed-circuit television (CCTV), access control and intrusion detection, car park management, fire alarm protection, key box, master antenna/cable television, central metering, water leakage detection, telephone management and public address and notification.

The building's owner employed a technology contractor to design all of the systems so that they will tie into a common building management platform for monitoring and control. The building controls, voice and data networks and security will share a common wired and wireless infrastructure.

Unfortunately, adoption of smart building technology has not by and large spread to the United States. For the last several years, a number of obstacles have caused the United States to lag in implementing intelligent building technology.

Observers such as Thomas A. Russo say that the industry is slowly overcoming these obstacles and laying a foundation for smart buildings in the United States. Russo is chief technology officer with Washington, D.C.-based Akridge, and an office developer, owner and manager that has embraced intelligent building systems. “We're going to make sure that all the systems talk to each other,” he says.

It seems that smart buildings just aren't that easy to build yet. Even the early adopters in Asia, according to industry observers, do not integrate their buildings tightly enough to handle all of the tasks contemplated by idealized scenarios.

Four barriers smart buildings must overcome

Observers cite four barriers blocking the widespread adoption of smart building technology. These include historically low energy costs in the United States compared to other countries, the perception that smart building technology adds costs, conventional contracting practices and proprietary building system technology — chiefly, security technology.

Asian and European building owners are adopting smart building technology as a way to combat sky-high energy costs, says David Orlik, an associate with the Baltimore-based architectural and engineering firm RTKL Inc. “In the United States, energy has been more abundant and less expensive than in other parts of the world,” he says.

Another barrier is a perception among owners that smart building technology costs too much, according to Russo. “An owner with buildings in the Washington, D.C., market, for example, probably has occupancy rates in the 90 percent range because you can build a building any way you want and tenants will occupy it in that kind of market,” he says. “So why put more money into the building?”

While experts say that it isn't particularly difficult to design buildings with smart, integrated systems, conventional contracting practices make such designs difficult to execute. “There is no one throat for the owner to choke when the technology integration doesn't work right,” says John Fenski, senior marketing manager with Johnson Controls. “General contractors issue subcontracts to heating, ventilating and air conditioning (HVAC) firms, fire alarm installers, security integrators, communications specialists and lighting contractors. They go about their business as standalone contractors. But a smart building requires a technical contractor responsible for making these systems work together.”

Finally, continues Fenski, there is the problem of proprietary technology that is proving difficult to integrate. “Migration toward standardized systems has been extremely slow, especially in security,” he says. “Owners have invested in expensive, proprietary security systems, and they don't feel they can cost effectively move away from those systems during expansions. There are ways around this, but they aren't easy.”

For a number of years, these problems have combined to suppress the implementation of smart building technology. But as energy costs have risen in the United States, owners have begun to take a harder look at smart building concepts. They are finding that the barriers really aren't so high after all.

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© 2008 Penton Media Inc.

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