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Report

Teaser, summary, work performed and final results

Periodic Reporting for period 2 - ENGINENCY (A Holistic System for Building Inspection and Energy Efficiency Management)

Teaser

Summary

The Enginency project has been conceived as a holistic solution for the efficient management of energy in building. The goal is to improve energy efficiency in buildings by reducing energy consumption and CO2 emissions. The solution proposed by Enginency includes three different approaches: wide scope, innovative approach and technology and a market differentiation. In addition, this generic solution is composed of others individual but complementary solutions such as inspection, monitoring, simulation, data processing, management and improvement proposals. Enginency solution will allow the user to reduce energy consumption of buildings with a zero-risk formula, as well as allow Energy Service Companies (ESCOs) to reduce inspection costs and time and obtaining more accurate results.

Work performed

Within the Enginency project, an energy simulation and calibration software called BCORE is developed, implemented, improved and presented as a Software as a Service (SaaS) completely translated into English. This software works in the Cloud and allows a non-expert user in IT to work and understand energy simulations results without any problem. A data acquisition system has been deployed in a pilot building to monitor real data and improve with them the modelling and simulating software. Different trials were performed to test the developed 3D post-processing tool to optimize the tool to the end-user knowledge and requisites.
ICM has created point acquisition modules using commercial sensors to recover indoor information like temperature, humidity, air quality from the dependences of Pilot 1 and Pilot 2. These sensors have been connected to CBSE Scada through Zigbee protocol. The information collected has been used by UVIGO in BCORE software.
In addition, a hardware has been developed to facilitate weather data (from physical sensors and meteo weather databases from forecast sites) to the SCADA and cloud services.
To create this hardware, Futurasmus has created a Multi-protocol OPEN Internet of Things (IoT) GATEWAY which is a physical device that serves as the connection point between the sensors (weather stations, sensors, intelligent devices and online weather forecast sites) and the CBSE SCADA from the company IPAS which can then be accessed by the SQL client in order to store this data in a cloud database.
Regarding the risk assessment and dissemination activities, a risk management plan has been presented as well as the extension of professional network, making impact by using upgraded websites, social media, leaflets. Finally, a variety of monitoring exams were implemented to map such commercialization opportunities and define their market penetration path.
The commercialization plan is established, addressing various business operation topics like (among others):
- analysis of the market potential in various sectors, focusing on Germany, Netherlands and Spain
- revision of the (positive) business case (costs, revenues, risks, etc.), based on acquired knowledge (e.g. commercial (pre-)agreements and cloud server solutions) during the project, for both the consortium and direct and indirect customers
- Sales and Customer Service Plan, based on a newly developed Customer & Business Cases Identification Framework, the definition of the proposition and the products, tools and services
Fully in line with the commercialization plan the pre-commercial Expert System was realized, integrating all upgraded individual ICT tools in a cloud server solution, and tested taken into outputs from the UNIR project and â€œMarques de Vallejoâ€ Pilot. The Expert System provides users with easy to understand high-level data in one clear dashboard and accessible in different ways.
Furthermore, the protection and exploitation of IP was investigated, resulting in actions to be carried out after the end of the project:
- Extension of current patents
- Additional research in the application of patents for software (in combination with hardware development)
- Reconsideration of the agreements made for the follow-up of Enginency
- Additional confidentiality measures will be determined to protect trade secrets
- A number of actions to prevent Enginency to be accused of infringing the copyright of third parties
The registration of (multiple) trademarks, not only for the Enginency brand, but also for products, tools and services.

Final results

Regarding the software, BCORE is a Building Energy Modelling (BEM) tool of own development. It is an advanced technological solution that enable the automated calibration of simulations. The new system facilitates the introduction of data and the fulfilling of the building model, decreasing both the costs of deployment and maintenance to the end user. It is a ground-breaking solution and a novel energy simulation program. Through a holistic approach, this software integrates into a single tool multiple utilities and applications, previously not found commercially combined; modelling, simulation, calibration, and the implementation of Energy Conservation Measures (ECMs) in buildings. In addition, BCORE has a friendly framework, easily usable for any end-user, not necessarily IT expert. The introduction of a real data building monitoring system provides an innovation solution.
The newly developed Expert System not only provides the outcomes from BCORE, but also incorporates knowledge from the Facility Asset Management System and real time data to give users insight in the calculated and actual Building Energy Performance for dynamic steering and long-term monitoring.
All knowledge gathered by researching the business operation topics provides the Enginency consortium the ammunition for successful and rapid market take up. This already resulted in a stronger pre-commercial market position as described in the business cases and technological impact in other (EU) projects e.g. the positive spin-off from cloud server solutions.
All data from the sensors moving to the cloud, or vice versa, goes through the gateway. The latetr pre-processes the data locally before sending it on to the cloud. When data is aggregated, summarized and tactically analysed by the gateway, it minimizes the volume of data that needs to be forwarded on to the cloud, which can have a big impact on response times and network transmission costs, thus the cloud server can be reduced considerably. With smaller cloud servers the overall cost can be much lower. The gateway allows the integration of almost any other IoT ready sensors (weather station from the most important brands in the market), which gives it the opportunity to adapt the project to any future requirement and geographic and climate situation.
Futurasmusâ€™s Multi-protocol OPEN Internet of Things (IoT) GATEWAY is also feature ready, meaning that it can be used to interconnect different building automation bus systems. For instance, KNX, Bacnet, Modbus, etc. Also, being an IoT gateway enables the possibility to connect of other protocols like MQTT, IFTTT, REST services, etc.
The transition media is also not limited to one but to many, like: Bluetooth, WiFi, Radio Protocols, LTE-A, and WiFi-Direct, RTU, TP, etc.
Additionally, to that the gateway can connect to most of internet meteorological weather databases in order to complement the on-site weather stations. More importantly, it facilitates the forecast acting as predictive measures in a building making it an EXPERT SYSTEM.