Understanding Smart Building Automation Systems: The Ultimate Guide
What are smart building automation systems?
Building automation systems (BAS) are used by facility management teams to automate the control of infrastructure like HVAC and lighting systems. Smart building automation systems take things a step further by connecting these automated systems through the Internet of Things (IoT), which allows teams to control BAS infrastructure with mobile phones and laptops rather than using specialized industrial computers.
Since smart systems are easier to control, companies can expand their automation capabilities to more devices and locations to create fully automated facilities. Smart building automation is used for:
Climate control (temperature, humidity, etc.)
Fire detection
CO monitoring
Lighting control
Water monitoring
Electrical usage
Security
Predictive maintenance
And many other use cases.
The Nodegrid Platform
The Nodegrid platform from ZPE Systems is the ideal infrastructure management solution for smart building automation systems because it employs probes and sensors to collect important data for controlling BAS operations. Contact ZPE Systems today to watch a free demo of Nodegrid in action.
The benefits of smart building automation
- Energy efficiency – Reduce your carbon footprint and take advantage of insurance discounts and tax credits.
- Cost savings – Lower your energy bills and extend the lifetime of your expensive equipment.
- Increased comfort – Improve customer satisfaction by providing more comfortable living and working environments.
- Air quality – Ensure adequate ventilation, monitor carbon monoxide levels, and manage air filters.
- Enhanced security – Prevent physical and virtual breaches through advanced smart security systems.
The challenges of managing smart building automation
While there are many advantages to using IoT smart building systems, there are some challenges to overcome. These include:
Managing closed ecosystems
Most smart building infrastructure is closed, meaning the devices and software don’t work well with other vendors’ systems. If you want to use multiple smart building systems to get the best features and pricing, you’ll have to juggle multiple management platforms.
For example, let’s say you use a Schneider Electric power management system, Johnson Controls for HVAC, and Siemens for room automation all in the same building. This configuration will give you some of the most robust tools and features for each use case, but to manage them all you’ll need to work in three different platforms. That’s three platforms to learn how to configure, operate, secure, optimize, and troubleshoot, creating a lot of management complexity and increasing the risk of human error.
Remotely recovering from failures
One of the major benefits of a “smart” system is that it uses IoT technology, which allows operators to remotely access and manage their building automation from anywhere in the world. This has enabled organizations to reduce their on-site staff at each of the facilities they manage while still ensuring optimal conditions. However, this means that network and internet access is vital to the continual operation of smart buildings. It also means that remote management teams could be cut-off from their building systems if the local network or ISP connection goes down.
Without on-site staff to recover from failures, organizations need to dispatch a truck roll, which is both time-consuming and expensive. Meanwhile, the people living and working in smart facilities could be left both figuratively and literally in the dark while they wait for the problem to be fixed.
Keeping smart building systems secure
Smart buildings often include IoT security cameras, door locks, and other devices that improve the physical security of a facility. These security measures can also prevent unauthorized access to server rooms, networking closets, and other areas of the building that provide a physical entry point to the enterprise network.
However, the building automation systems themselves are often vulnerable to attack due to inadequate security policies, out-of-date software, and configuration mistakes. If cybercriminals gain access to these systems, they’ll have control over the entire smart facility, presenting a massive security and safety risk.
Tips for successful smart building automation
Vendor-neutral platforms
Individual building automation systems may not play well together by default, but a vendor-neutral infrastructure management platform can help unify all these solutions for easier management. For example, a vendor-neutral serial console directly connects to smart building devices and systems so they can all be accessed and controlled from one place. A fully open serial console like the Nodegrid Serial Console Plus (NSCP) can also host third-party building automation software, or you can use APIs to integrate third-party systems with Nodegrid’s ZPE Cloud management platform.
With a vendor-neutral platform, you can create a fully customized smart building automation environment using all your favorite vendor systems and devices and manage it all from one centralized application.
OOB management and cellular failover
The ability to remotely troubleshoot and recover from failures will save you time and money on truck rolls. One way to ensure continuous management access to remote building automation systems is with out-of-band (OOB) management. OOB management uses serial consoles to create a dedicated management network, with an alternative external interface (e.g., a 5G cellular SIM card) to provide reliable internet access even when the main ISP or WAN link goes down. With an OOB serial console, building operators can remotely access and troubleshoot smart automation systems and quickly recover from outages.
In addition, since smart building automation relies on the internet, an ISP outage could cause systems to go down across the entire facility. To ensure that vital devices like door locks, security cameras, and lighting systems stay online, you need to be able to failover the network to an alternative internet connection. High-speed cellular failover is an ideal solution because it doesn’t rely on the same fiber or broadband infrastructure as your ISP, so weather events and natural disasters that cause your main connection to drop won’t affect your failover connection.
With a combination of out-of-band management and cellular failover, you can ensure the continuous operation of your smart building automation systems and reduce the time, expense, and headaches involved in remote troubleshooting.
Advanced security
With smart building systems, it’s important not to sacrifice security for convenience. Any smart device or IoT sensor that connects to the internet needs to be protected by the same robust security policies and controls that are used to protect IT devices. The Zero Trust security methodology provides guidelines and best practices for things like access control policies, network segmentation, identity verification, and authentication. One of the core principles of Zero Trust is the consistent application of security policies to every entity on the network, which will help you keep smart building systems protected.
Additionally, building automation systems are often targets of cyberattacks because the software running on the devices is out-of-date. Security patches are required to address any vulnerabilities that hackers may have discovered in the operating system or management software, but it can be difficult to stay on top of the update schedules for so many smart devices in so many facilities. Some smart building automation vendors provide a managed service that includes patch releases and the regular installation of OS updates, which usually comes at an additional cost.
Another option is to use a platform like Nodegrid, which consolidates patch management for the entire smart building automation environment behind a single pane of glass. Facility operators can use Nodegrid to view software versioning information and push out updates to any smart building device connected to a Nodegrid serial console.
With Zero Trust security measures and comprehensive patch management, you’ll ensure the safety and security of smart building systems.
ZPE’s guide to network automation
Smart building automation systems make it easier to control facility operations efficiently and optimally from anywhere in the world. ZPE Systems’ Network Automation Blueprint provides an in-depth guide to developing a resilient, fully-automated network infrastructure that supports smart building automation.