BIMBoy: Cisco announces "smart" buildings initiative

Last week, Cisco Systems announced Smart Connected Buildings , a new business initiative to connect and control buildings and their automation systems in order to better control energy use. 

Ciscos’s Mediator

To do that, Cisco introduced its Network Building Mediator, pictured below, a device that connects HVAC, lighting, security and other buildings systems to Cisco’s EnergyWise platform. The device integrates the protocols of proprietary building automation systems and, in effect, translates them to Internet protocol, meaning facilities managers and even office emloyees can control their buildings over the net. Cisco described the device as a key component that will help realize its vision of Smart+Connected Communities, a corporate goal that includes energy grid management, sustainable design and whole communities interconnected through IP. Sunnyvale, Calif., company NetApp was mentioned as an early adopter that had reported energy efficiency gains.

Nick Chong, director of converged building services marketing at Cisco, said using a Smart Connected configuration could already net up to 25 LEED points from categories as diverse as daylighting controls, measuring and monitoring, HVAC, and energy efficiency. He also said Cisco was working with groups such as the U.S. Green Building Council to make sure green building standards are sophisticated enough to allow points for interconnected systems such as Smart Connected Buildings.

"We believe the role technology can play in ‘green’ city design is in the connections between a building and its systems," Chong said. 

Martin De Beer, director of emerging technologies for Cisco, said his group is focused on this inititative because of the huge number of new internet users that will come from the urbanization of previously underserved populations, such as rural China and India. Cisco estimates 3 billion new internet users will come from urbanization in the next five years, and he hopes that Smart Connected communities will help them sustainably join the urban power grid.

Never has the demand for real, energy-saving technology been higher in the AEC community. Still, Cisco’s ambitious goal has been tried before. Companies such as Convia and Johnson Controls have made great strides in personalized commercial infrastructure, but mass adoption still hasn’t happened. Here’s to hoping that controlling everything over IP is the killer app.BD+C