Remote HVAC Monitoring – This is What Facility Managers Need to Know

First, There Was the Fan...

More precisely, a very primitive cooling system.

The humidity in the summer of 1902 was unbearable. It was so bad that it damaged the products of a US print house, causing the pages to swell and the printed ink to blur.

The print house turned to the evolving cooling industry for a solution, and asked Willis Carrier, a 25-year-old experimental engineer, to create a cooling system, with the aim of reducing the humidity around the print house and decreasing the room temperature.

The cooling system was a success, and Carrier continued developing his invention. In 1922 he invented a safer, smaller and more powerful Centrifugal Refrigeration Compressor. (The Smithsonian Magazine)

The beginning of the HVAC industry can be traced back to this moment.

We’ve come a long way since the first HVAC. This is not only in terms of mechanics, but also in terms of remote HVAC monitoring and communication abilities.

Facilities Managers and the 4th Industrial Revolution

At the beginning of 2010s, the 4th Industrial Revolution began. One of the main components of this revolution was the Internet of Things . This means the ability to connect machines to each other, make them communicate with each other, and the ways in which we can control these machines remotely through the Cloud.

How did this evolution impact the daily lives of Facilities Managers? In one word: Positively.

Commercial HVAC Monitoring: the Benefits of the 4th Industrial Revolution

Before the 4th Industrial Revolution, Facilities Managers who were responsible for managing HVAC systems on multiple floors, buildings, or sites, were presented with a unique difficulty: they had to physically attend to all the HVACs on the different sites, in order to view, monitor and manage them.

In worst cases, if malfunctions occurred on multiple sites, the Facilities Managers had to hop from site to site in no time. A lot of their time was also spent traveling to sites, which did not have any issues. This not only wasted time, but took it away from more critical sites.

Thankfully, that’s changed. The 4th Industrial Revolution, coupled with the growth of IOT and Remote HVAC Monitoring means that Facilities Managers can manage HVACs on buildings, retail and hotel chains, AirBnbs, and more – remotely.

Since everything is connected, Facilities Managers can now monitor any HVAC systems on any connected site – from the comfort of their office. This allows them to identify risks and notify the relevant service company, so they can send the right people to the right location with the right tools.

Remote HVAC Monitoring - a Game Changer for Facility Managers

The 4th Industrial Revolution resulted in the development of a remote, cloud-based HVAC monitoring solution solution designed specifically for the needs of Facilities Managers. .

Facilities Managers can now view all the connected commerical HVACs systems at all the connected sites – through a single, remote interface.

This remote HVAC monitoring solution allows Facilities Managers to

Optimize HVAC management, by operating the HVAC remotely and increasing its energy efficiency – This is particularly important in a time of rising energy costs
Apply HVAC Remote Diagnostic tools
Receive real-time system error notifications for malfunctioning HVAC systems

And when a malfunction occurs in an HVAC on a distant site, the Facilities Manager receives a push notification, and can instantly call up the HVAC Service Provider and send them to fix the malfunction in no time.

VRF Power Distribution - the Buzz-Phrase of the HVAC World World

The 4th industrial revolution enabled the rapid development and emergence of VRF Power Distribution, which became accessible through the cloud. This allows HVAC service companies to identify where energy suck may be occurring, so that the commercial HVAC system can be optimized. This has the effect of reducing tenants’ energy costs, which is critical to business retention in 2023.

This solution is enabled by connecting a Wattmeter to the power circuit of the VRF’s outdoor units in the building. This connection allows to break down the overall consumption of the VRF system to each of the system’s individual indoor units.

By implementing this function, Facilities Managers can bill their tenants accurately – by the actual operational demand of each of the VRF system’s indoor units.

As you probably already know, HVAC is one of the most energy-consuming appliances in a building. And when it comes to tenants’ billing, precision is of a high importance. That’s why billing tenants by their actual HVAC consumption is so essential.

For more information about how remote HVAC monitoring can benefit Facilities Managers – Contact Us, and we’ll be happy to answer any of your questions.