How will green offices be achieved? What do people we work with think?
A recent Financial Times article highlighted the Great Green Office Crunch and the issues that the sector currently faces when upgrading and decarbonising buildings such as offices.
At amBX, we position ourselves as part of the solution, but we rely on system integrators using us, smart building platforms (or BMS) embedding us in their platforms or other stakeholders such as building consultants specifying us.
We believe this is the way forward for the industry and a way of simplifying a very complicated process. If big players have an ecosystem of partners embedded, each with their own strengths and responsibilities, they can deliver a solution more efficiently, have more support, can provide the client with extra value and, most importantly, accelerate the decarbonisation of the built space.
On our podcast, we have interviewed many stakeholders across the industry, some of whom we are partnered with. The attitude of nearly all of these stakeholders is very much that partnership and integration are needed for us all to thrive and achieve net zero.
Here are some quotes that encapsulate the views of a cross-section of the industry:
“Existing buildings are not built in a standardized way, so the engineering control systems that they're running and the way the systems are procured, configured and maintained are different every time. You've got new challenges in every building.” Paul Reid – Onnec.
“It can be very difficult and costly to pull data out of different systems. Part of the hallmark of a smart building is bringing multiple streams of data together and integrating technology.” - Joe Aamador – Aamador Consulting.
“A very small percentage of buildings are new, so the focus has to be on existing buildings and getting the data and information from the existing infrastructure, standardising it and sending it to a single source.” - Glen Schrank, Phoenix Energy Technologies.
“The industry has moved from being very closed to embracing this more open standard. Previously, companies would have put barriers up to stop collaboration, but they're now lowering those barriers and wanting to work together.” Stephen Jackson – Casambi.
“Building management systems have historically been too complex and need to be simplified; this is one of the many reasons smaller buildings tend to be less environmentally friendly; another is cost and payback.” – Chris Irwin – J2 Innovations.
“Cost is always going to be a strong motivator, in my opinion. And this is the case when implementing ESG strategies; as energy costs have increased so dramatically, it has become a very strong driver.” - Reinhard Mayr - NET X Automation.
“Lighting is one of the biggest energy consumers in commercial buildings; it’s important its impact is reviewed. Lighting is responsible for approx. 39% of energy in commercial buildings, but this increases to 45% for buildings such as hospitals and hotels”. Mark Willmott – TheisCraft.
“The technology is there, but our commercial buildings are so complex and difficult because of all of these historical silos. I think what will happen is technology will become easier to specify. I think technology will integrate in a much more straightforward way. Someone will have to play the part of pulling all of the data into one place; that will be an interesting role.” Rob Mitchell – SSE.
“It's very unlikely that you're going to have one system or one vendor system in a building. Part of this IoT movement is pulling different devices together into one ecosystem where data works together.” - James Bellingham – Siemens.
Discover more conversations on our podcast.
