Could smart buildings make us safer in the fight against COVID-19?


eBOM explores how intelligent buildings are evolving, their role in the fight against COVID, and the technologies driving their success. 

In the week when the Smart Buildings Show takes place in the UK, eBOM explores how intelligent buildings are evolving and the emergence of new technologies driving their success. 

From the design phase through to the end of a building’s life, the integration of ‘smart’ technology can help optimize the performance of a building for its occupants. By connecting subsystems that traditionally function independently, such as lighting, HVAC and access control, it is possible to enhance total building performance.  

From reduced maintenance costs to minimizing a building’s environmental impact, the potential for smart building technology is huge. The emergence of intelligent sensors and wireless network technologies are pushing the internet of things to new extremes and as we emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic – could they also keep us safer? 

Healthy buildings 

In interesting news from the US, Johnson Controls has been collaborating with higher education establishments to improve indoor air quality and increase the safety of learning environments in response to COVID-19. 

As part of its OpenBlue Healthy Buildings offering, Johnson Controls worked with nearly 900 institutions to prepare campuses for the autumn 2021 reopening. With campuses keen to address short-term COVID-19 needs, as well as long-term health goals, Johnson Controls was able to provide clean air solutions that help mitigate the spread of airborne pathogens; touchless security solutions to minimize contamination; and flexible facility solutions that allow campus leaders to rapidly repurpose spaces as needed.  

All these solutions can be automated for scalable, efficient, and ongoing optimization.  

Sensor solutions 

At the cutting edge of any smart building infrastructure are sensors – lots and lots of sensors, from the humble passive infrared (PIR) motion sensor to cameras equipped with high-resolution CMOS image sensors. The ability to monitor the building environment and relay that data to control and adjust building systems in real-time is taking smart buildings to the next level. 

Digital pressure and environment sensors provide accurate sensing of air flow, temperature and humidity as well as detecting human presence for responsive environmental controls. And across the board, sensors are becoming smaller, more sensitive, and more ‘intelligent’. 

Take, for example, Omron’s D6T-32L thermal sensor with people detection algorithm, which can reliably detect people and objects in a wide area across its 90.0° by 90.0° field of view. These characteristics, combined with the facial recognition features of the company’s HVC-P2 and the “mechanical eye” capabilities of the TOF sensor module, ensure designers can implement advanced possibilities in lighting and access control, as well as in occupancy monitoring for infection control within buildings. 

Intelligent networks 

By harvesting, aggregating, and interpreting data from disparate sensors, it is possible to improve the overall performance of the buildings where we live and work. Smart buildings can be tuned to consume less energy, cost less to operate, and are healthier for occupants.  

For new builds, even with the latest technology, the challenge is to ensure that building digitization is fully optimized, whilst being future proofed for decades to come. For existing buildings which have separate building and energy management systems, legacy analogue low intelligence sensors, and a myriad of existing cabling types and interfaces, there are even greater challenges to implementing smart building solutions.

In some scenarios, these challenges can be overcome using technologies such as IEEE802.3cg 10Base-T1L long reach Ethernet. This two-wire communication allows data and power over twisted pair up to 1km at 10MB/s. This enables seamless IP all the way to the edge in new and existing buildings, allowing the amalgamation of data from insightful sensors, to provide energy and cost savings. 

Working wireless 

Increasingly, however, smart buildings are moving towards wireless network solutions thanks to their flexibility and scaleability. 

Mesh technologies for IoT and Cloud-connected sensor network applications, such as those from EU specialist, NeoCortec, for example, are designed to offer a dynamic solution with almost no limit to network size or depth. NeoMesh modules are available for 2.4GHz as well as sub 1GHz frequency bands with a footprint of just 11x18x2.6mm and current consumption is as low 20 µA.  

With low power consumption and the ability to evolve over time, intelligent wireless networks could well provide the basis for future smart building evolution. From cleaner, greener buildings to COVID-safe spaces, intelligent building design will be keeping us safer and healthier for many years to come. 

Companies:

Smart Building Show

Johnson Controls

Omron

Neocortec


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