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Recently, the French Federation, Domotics, and the Smart Building Alliance (SBA) for Smart City awarded Jean-Pierre Moreau of Light and Room Control EcoXpert™, Connectibat, the 2017 Smart Building prize. The event was part of the international Mondial du bâtiment exhibition. Having one of our esteemed EcoXpert partners earn this honor, prompted us to take the opportunity to provide some insight into the day-to-day real life of a Schneider Electric L&RC EcoXpert partner. KNX projects (or C-Bus) are, of course, a core part of their activity and service offering.
However, the continuing evolution of Internet of Things (IoT) technology is redefining the world in which we live and the ways we interact with that technology. Today’s building automation professionals must consider the growing need for full and seamless integration that incorporates a variety of different components and elements including:
- Specialist system controls, including:
- Power Distribution
- HVAC
- Door Entry
- Security
- Audio/Video
- Emergency Lighting
- Specialist software, including:
- Property Management (Hotels),
- Meeting room booking (Offices),
- Classroom occupation planning (Secondary schools)
- Communication protocols, including:
- BACnet
- Modbus
- DALI
- ZigBee
Whether the project in question is residential or a small to midsize building, a Light & Room Control solution that successfully integrates all these disparate elements can provide the comprehensive collection of applications required by the full range of users. It will be able to provide comfort and convenience to building occupants, and also deliver efficiency and reliability to service providers in as various areas as security, operation & maintenance, energy, and cleaning.
Each of these providers needs a specific Internet access to a single BMS-in-a-box. This access allows each user to access the information he needs and also gives him the ability to issue various commands in the building. Though home automation and mid-market building automation solutions are the targets for a variety of connected systems, most homeowners and facility managers aren’t equipped to cope with the cost and complexity of a building supervision system. Because of these constraints, powerful controllers are a critical feature of solutions serving these markets. Such controllers include helpful features such as:
- Monitoring and trending
- Alarming
- Automation
- Multi-protocol Connectivity
- Embedded Web Server
- Cyber-security
Below is a typical light and room control architecture example that helps to illustrate what these capabilities look like in an actual system configuration as implemented by Light & Room Control EcoXpert.
In this case, the project covers the core applications required by a mid-size office building:
- Lighting & blind control, HVAC control, and monitoring of energy & power
- spaceLYnk is the key controller that enables connection between KNX and Modbus protocol, while offering IP connectivity for the full set of user interfaces, which can be used either on-site or via remote access.
Learn more about our Light and Room Control EcoXpert partners and how their expert ability for home and small building automation is delivering value-add to customers all over the world.
How do you address your mid-market building automation needs to meet the challenges your customers face?
