Evolution in technology improves and makes so many operations easy and accessible. Technology is also harnessed by building engineers and construction technologists for the smooth construction and maintenance of buildings.
For this, several tools have been integrated alongside others to achieve maximum accuracy and result. Some of these tools are also applied in retro-commissioning to predict future faults of buildings and resolve them before a total breakdown.
In this article, we will review most of the recent and soon-to-be-applied technological advancements that have been brought into play to save building energy and enhance the maintenance of smart commercial buildings.
What is Fault detection and diagnostics?
Fault detection and diagnostics (FDD) is a software tool that is designed to proactively discover any problem with a building’s system. It also identifies several optimization opportunities before they result in an alarm, excessive waste of resources, discomfort on occupants, or a total failure of the building system.
In the past years, fault detection and diagnostics procedures in both commercial and retail buildings were done manually or with basic tools and didn’t help much. Besides this, sometimes the results were also inaccurate.
Several commercial buildings are often equipped with lots of air handling units and terminal boxes that maintain the quality of indoor air and the thermal comfort of occupants of these buildings. While building engineers are left with the responsibility of maintaining and improving air, heat, and ventilation issues using data analysis of this equipment.
Where Does The Future Of Fault Detection And Diagnostics Lie?
Automatic fault detection and diagnostics software has greatly influenced the basic FDD and also serves as the utmost problem-solving tool. Automatic fault detection is designed to overcome several limitations in building analysis and maintenance. The software monitors and investigates the HVAC system and equipment issues that decrease building performance.
Building operators who intervene when there are complaints from occupants as a result of failure in any of these systems or a failure in building automation can now harness these advanced tools to yield more technical and strategic results.
Enhanced Fault Detection and Diagnostics Tools
- Predictive Analytics:
This is a branch of data analysis that is greatly in use in fault detection. Building engineers or operators have been able to incorporate this form of data analysis to maintain commercial buildings and predict future faults.
This is applied during a thorough analysis of every data gathered during a building’s investigation. This system further identifies future faults before they occur, thereby enabling well-regulated and immediate maintenance of the building and reducing the time of damage.
In addition, predictive analysis aids in the optimization of building energy, and its consumption alongside enhancing the operational level of the building.
- Advanced Building Management Systems(BMS):
In large commercial buildings, typical building management systems (BMS) are applied to detect several faults in cases where equipment crashes or is less functional.
This system monitors, supervises, controls, and also provides feedback on smart building technology systems. Some of its basic functions may include access control and HVAC analysis, video surveillance, fire alarms, and management of the building’s energy.
In addition, these systems provide information on the functions of supervised buildings, some of which include the building’s current state, past information, and the summary of the building’s analysis. It also detects and manages alarms and many other situations.
Furthermore, it provides diagnostic monitoring and reporting of the system’s operational functions. It also creates an interface between individual smart building applications.
- Artificial Intelligence(Ai) And Machine learning(ML):
The incorporation of AI in building management makes it easy to avoid certain issues that may not be detected by using basic tools. Artificial intelligence covers a wide range of algorithms that imitate the human mind.
This method includes deep learning, machine learning, computation, and several other unique methods.
In addition, fault detection using machine learning overcomes a lot of challenges by analyzing present and past building data analysis.
ML-driven analytics are highly active in the identification of issues with any building system. Especially smart buildings, and allows for immediate actions before a total crash or failure of the building, which will result in complaints from occupants.
Investing in fault detection using Machine learning provides building occupants with moderate energy consumption which is a financial advantage as bills are reduced. It also plays a vital role in prolonging the life of building equipment. This results in overall comfort and less or no complaints from occupants.
- Advanced Sensor Technology:
The incorporation of improved sensor technology enables the swift and easy detection of several faults and issues in a building.
In addition, these sensors monitor several parameters such as temperature, humidity, air quality, and the rate of energy consumption of a building. It further provides highly detailed information on the building’s level of operation.
- Advanced Computation:
Bulks of data are often collected during building analysis. These data must be stored as they serve reference purposes over the years. The safe way to store them would be on a quality computer system. In fault detection and diagnostics, cloud computing offers a solution to data storage issues.
The storing and analyzing of bulky building data provides ease and swift access to information based on diagnosis.
Building engineers, operators, and the team responsible for any form of maintenance around the building will be able to share and create data among themselves.
- Enhanced Energy Management System:
Typical energy management tools can identify and optimize energy consumption and inefficiencies as regards the energy inflow of a building. It analyzes energy data, its mode of usage, level of demand, and cost.
However, with a more advanced energy management system, various building systems such as HVAC, lighting, and energy consumption, are actively monitored and controlled. It also analyzes and provides insight into data collected from utility meters, sensors, and several other equipment that consume energy.
In addition, it assists building operators by identifying issues regarding energy within the building, tracks the use of energy, and also provides relevant information on ways to optimize energy consumption.
Benefits of Advanced Fault Detection and Diagnostics Tools
- Swift and effective fault detection. It also provides room for business operators to make strategic plans on how to optimize some operation issues of a building.
- Fault detection enables the maintenance of heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems by effectively identifying issues with the system. This results in an immediate fixing of the issue to prevent damage.
- Ensures that equipment is reliable and reduces the cost of repair which may arise as a result of a complete breakdown
- Improves office productivity: Early detection of faults, especially on building systems such as HVAC, will keep the employees in a better condition to work as air conditioning issues will be identified early enough and also resolved.
- Minimal complaints: The general issue most building owners face from both retail and commercial buildings is complaints from occupants. But with the impact of advanced and automatic FDD, these will greatly reduce as occupants will enjoy the comfort of their homes and the effective operation of the building systems.
Conclusion
The future of fault detection and diagnostics lies in the automation of several of its software. It also requires the integration of some external tools such as cloud-based computing to facilitate the protection and storage of building data.
Furthermore, it is advised that buildings undergo adequate commissioning to facilitate the detection of potential faults in a building’s system.