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5 Minutes With… Gareth Fox, Business Development Manager for AXON

 960 640 Stuart O'Brien
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In the latest instalment of our energy management executive interview series, we sat down with AXON Business Development Manager, Gareth Fox to talk about industry challenges and the opportunities, with a focus on how to develop strategies for greater building efficiencies…

What is the biggest priority for the Energy Management industry in 2020?

We need to start thinking of buildings as machines, productivity is the output whilst energy and people are the inputs. 

Approaching the management of a building from the people stand-point means we can deliver greater efficiencies. Providing a responsive space for occupants, by connecting and integrating services, is the next priority for greater building efficiency. 

We do this with cars, modern cars know fuel economy, tyre pressures, speed, lets you know when it needs a service or there is a problem, tells you when to turn right or left to avoid traffic, what the temperature is inside and outside (some even turn on your vehicle in the morning so that the frost has cleared and the car is comfortable and ready to drive at a predetermined time at the correct temperature).

We have similar measures within a building but data is currently siloed, if a single building performance platform could combine this information then it takes on more meaning. 

In your mind what is the biggest challenge the industry faces currently?

Moving on from measuring performance by energy data alone is the biggest challenge. 

Being efficient is key to all aspects of life, whether it’s doing the job right first time, using the right tools for the task, having the correct information to make decisions, all of these help improve efficiency and energy reduction is a by-product of these efficiencies. 

To make the correct efficiency choices, it is best to have precise information and the right skill set in place. Building Performance Information is key, combining the Energy Data, with Building Services and People & Wellbeing to give the total picture of performance vs productivity vs costs. Its no-good turning equipment off to save money but adversely affecting your business performance.

We need to be clever in mapping data, so to deliver meaningful insights. Managing buildings and estates is more than just energy data, with Smart buildings and IoT we are able to gather data from other plant and services, so giving a more rounded data picture on how to develop strategies for greater building efficiencies.

And what are the biggest opportunities?

I still see messaging around basic “Top Hat” energy profiling. Whilst this is fundamentally correct and has been for at least the last 16 years that I have been associated with the industry. However granular information of each service to a building e.g. lighting, HVAC, Energy, Room Booking, Access Control, Way Finding, etc. can reap more rewards when combining data to make improvements. The approach being that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. 

What if you were able to map your energy usage with occupancy usage, to tailor building services to demand? 

Not so long ago our mobile phones, were just that, phones. We didn’t need them to be anything else. We had a camera, we had an MP3 player and we had a bank card. Now our phones are wallets, calculators, maps and whatever else you choose according to the apps you have installed. We wouldn’t want to leave the house without them. 

Smart building technology means the way we interact and manage our buildings is evolving in a similar way. Building management is more than just a BMS interface, a lighting network, an HVAC system. With cloud-based technology and IoT we can gather data from all these elements and more. We can map this data onto one platform and provide Big Building Data.

For example, you could map the BMS data with your lighting and your meeting room booking system. In this instance you could manage the energy around meeting rooms in an office location more effectively. When not in use you could power off all appliances in that space. You could even instruct for cleaning to be put on hold.

What technology is going to have the biggest impact on the market this year?

The industry is at a juncture, we know we have the building data we are just unclear how to proceed to make this big building data of use. The combining of information from multiple disparate services is seen as a challenge. I see AXON at the forefront of this challenge, providing a way to overlay existing systems, to provide meaningful building performance data. 

Tell us about your company, products and services.

AXON seamlessly integrates data onto one platform. A technology independent platform, AXON acquires data from multiple sources for energy, metering, lighting, environment and occupancy, providing estate performance analytics at all levels. Providing actionable insights so you can optimise the management of your estate. The platform provides visualisations and reporting to support the various stakeholders within the building, providing actionable insights for carbon reduction, energy and operational efficiencies. 

In 2025 we’ll all be talking about…?

About the measurement of proven in-use outcomes against design intent. Hopefully we will have realised the benefit of mapping data and be thinking more holistically about our smart buildings, measuring performance values not just in terms of energy data. With this new data we will then be turning our thoughts to how the building is performing against the design, so closing the loop on building data, from design, construction and in-use. Ultimately we will be approaching building management for the occupants point of view. We will be using a wide range of technologies to deliver interactive spaces that meet their requirements in real-time, providing ever smart spaces that promote happy occupants.

Contact Gareth to find out more:

Gareth Fox

Business Development Manager

AXON Building Performance Solutions

+44 7810 636536

gfox@axon.eco

linkedin.com/in/gareth-fox-axon

www.axon.eco

Energy Monitoring and Targeting – Mapping data to gain more meaning

 960 640 Guest Post
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Gathering energy data to measure the performance of your building estate is commonplace. With rising energy costs and a move towards reducing carbon it is of course important to monitor and report on the energy usage across your building estate. Automatic Monitoring and Targeting (AM&T) is a standard process for energy reduction, but what if there was another way?

A more intelligent approach to energy use in buildings

What if you were able to map your energy usage with occupancy usage, to tailor building services to demand? Resulting in an optimised, more efficient building. What if you were able to collate data from different building services to provide a more intelligent approach to usage? For example, you could map the BMS data with your lighting and your meeting room booking system. In this instance you could manage the energy around meeting rooms in an office location more effectively. When not in use you could power off all appliances in that space. You could even instruct for cleaning to be put on hold. But when a meeting is scheduled you could automate the HVAC to bring the room up to temperature in time for the start of the booking, you could initiate the lighting and instruct for cleaning to take place afterwards. Additionally, if the meeting was cancelled yet not updated on the system, the space if not entered in the first 15 minutes, could be relaxed and automatically made available for others whilst also saving valuable consumption. By mapping different services within one building you are then able to be smarter with your energy and service provision.

The AXON platform gathers big building data, to provide visualisations and reporting on energy, consumption, lighting, environment and occupancy, for estate performance analytics at all levels. By seamlessly integrating your building data onto the technology independent AXON platform you can optimise the performance of your estate today. There is no need to change or install different plant equipment, AXON is brand agnostic and can be connected to your existing BMS.

Providing fair and transparent recharging of utility costs to occupants

Another added benefit to gathering big building data is the ability to accurately bill energy costs to tenants, known as intelligent apportionment. With AXON this process can be automated and is something we have done for buildings such as London Bridge City estate including Hays Galleria, Cottons Centre, No 1 London Bridge City and 2 & 6 More London. Broadgate Estates were looking for a platform that was technology independent, a platform that could integrate disparate data streams from the technologies installed within the estate. Broadgate Estates wanted to reduce the overall energy consumption of their clients’ building stock, whilst also provide fair and transparent recharging of utility costs to occupants. 

Broadgate Estates have experience in using the disparate technologies within a building to reduce consumption and deliver occupier bills. Yet existing solutions, in their opinion, were not integrated or automated sufficiently; or there was a commercial bind between the software platform and a specific brand of hardware. Importantly they wanted to combine data from both the energy management system (EMS) and BMS to identify energy reduction opportunities, to then also prove the outcome of the remedy.

Working with AXON they were able to achieve a significant reduction in operational hours per annum resulting in identified energy savings of 1,935,876 kWh.

If you wish to take a more informed approach to your building management then please get in touch with the AXONteam to learn more. CONTACT US