Building Automation

OK folks, I offer a chance to be heard and influence the conversation.

In today’s world we have some difficult energy related circumstances. In the Heating Ventilation and Air Conditioning business, the Engineers who work behind the scenes to design build and maintain our buildings and energy infrastructure are working hard to ensure a safe, healthful and sustainable future for us to enjoy.

HVAC for our air conditioning is a major if not dominant portion of the load on our electrical grid. The grid for purpose defined as both Electrical Generation and Distribution. The sad fact is very few new power plants have been built in the last decades, so while electrical demand has increased greatly, the legacy generation base has aged with no significant replacement of these generating resources. On top of that the distribution systems that include high tension cables, transformer stations, local transformers and all the relays sensors and automated controls that go into making it all flow are also aging. Coupled with that is the regular mundane maintenance of clearing trees and brush along the power lines which although manageable, costs a fair amount of money. We should make note that part of the root cause of the Great East Coast / Midwest Blackout (just a name I invented) was caused by lack of proper tree maintenance.

We should also not forget the California draconian regulation that led to the rise and fall of Enron, and the rolling blackouts of the not to distant past.