There are many elements to consider when implementing a smart building, and the challenges that come with it are many. From knowledge gaps to budget constraints, creating a smart building cannot be done without overcoming these hurdles.
There are many elements to consider when implementing a smart building, and the challenges that come with it are many. From knowledge gaps to budget constraints, creating a smart building cannot be done without overcoming these hurdles.
According to Luis Suau's, Technical Leader of Kinetic Industrial Products at
Cisco Systems, the main challenges and concerns fall into three main categories — risk, security and knowledge gap. “Ultimately these challenges and concerns are reduced over time as the technology becomes common place, and in the early days the early adopters help pave the way to the general acceptance of the technology as has been observed in other industries,” he said.
The largest of the risk elements lies in lack of familiarity of the technology with the various actors of the construction process, Suau explained; this includes the architects, engineers, project managers, designers, advisors and building departments. To illustrate this point, Suau used the example of new PoE digital devices. “While standards and codes allow the use of low voltage network technology for power and control, the use of these new PoE digital devices is often times something new and unfamiliar from the traditional building plans and divisions of work. Building departments may also be unfamiliar with the PoE and may not understand the use of the PoE network for power and control of building infrastructure devices in submitted building plans. The final risk also lies in the procurement process of the construction industry where equipment substitutions take place influenced by reps and distribution processes.”
Understanding new technologies and finding the right people to execute these technologies can also be difficult and costly. “Time spent on education and absorbing the nuances of emerging technologies is always a factor in how fast new solutions can be teed up for financial priority,” Terrence McManus, VP of Business Development at
BuildingIQ, noted. “The responsibility is on technology vendors to do a better job of educating the market on the financial returns and other benefits associated with the adoption of smart technologies.”
Aseem Joshi, Country GM of India at
Honeywell Building Solutions, explained the importance of finding a systems integrator (SI) well-versed in the technologies at hand: “One of the challenges in developing a smart building is the selection of SIs responsible for implementation and execution of the project. An SI should be identified as a ‘trusted advisor’ and not merely a turnkey integrator with focus on optimizing the cost. The selection should be based on the ability of an SI to leverage in-house technology, deliver a site on-time in adherence to quality protocols, and ensure lifecycle management of the infrastructure with in-house service team and advanced service technology. Project management skills is an add-on and not an essential assessment criteria.”
Another major challenge is budget. A building may have any number of prospective projects and opportunities available; however, due to limited budget, only a certain number of projects can be funded. “Asset managers and purchasing decision makers prioritize ROI initiatives that have a direct impact on what gets accomplished in a calendar year. Smart initiatives must deliver an attractive ROI, or they will go to the back of the line,” McManus explained.
In terms of cloud-based smart building solutions, Nguyen noted that there is a fair amount of fear and uncertainty, along with a healthy dose of territoriality, affiliated with such solutions. “The reality, though, is that smart building technologies provide data-driven assistance on top of existing relationships and roles. The net of which is making the facilities managers’ jobs easier and maximizing resources; and, of course, uncovering issues that only, one, data analysis can uncover, and, two, require hard data to build a case for taking action,” he said.
A Smarter Future Ahead
Smart buildings have a lot to look forward to in the future. As cities continue to push intelligence, buildings will need to rise to the challenge. Additionally, more advanced technologies and better understanding of how to utilize things like big data and new iterations of the IoT will only ensure that buildings will continue to get smarter.