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Smart Buildings Week Recap – Webinar Recordings Now Available

September 24, 2020 By SBC staff

Thanks to those of you who participated in Virtual Smart Buildings Week last week! We enjoyed hosting these compelling discussions and really appreciate our panelists sharing their knowledge and insight. If you missed the sessions or would like to watch them again, the recordings are now available on the Smart Buildings Center YouTube channel.

Using Data and Analytics to Improve Performance
This opening session explores the here and now of smart buildings, systems typically involved in a smart strategy, data analytics and integration management, interoperability opportunities/challenges, and the smart buildings of tomorrow.

Watch Recording
Download Slides

Grid Enabled Efficient Buildings
This session covers the “classic” demand response programs and actions, the dynamic two-way communication between buildings and the utility, how both building owners and the utility derive value from having this grid interactive capability, and ideal program features that would help make GEBs a reality.

Watch Recording
Download Slides

Achieving Persistent Operational Performance
This session examines the nexus of building operations and technology, finding plug-and-play and interoperable platforms, the role of human systems in optimizing the operation of buildings, addressing the root causes of building inefficiencies, and bridging the IT/OT divide.

Watch Recording
Download Slides

Creating Intelligent Spaces
This closing session explores how IoT is transforming the world and built environment; how smart technologies and practices lead to improved organizational productivity, better space utilization, and more efficient and healthier buildings; and key considerations that can help building owners and operators make a successful transformation to buildings that are more agile, flexible, efficient, and productive.

Watch Recording
Download Slides

Thank you again for joining us for Smart Buildings Week, and stay tuned for announcements about upcoming smart buildings events!

Filed Under: SBX, Smart Buildings Week

Join Us Next Week for Virtual Smart Buildings Week!

September 8, 2020 By SBC staff

If you haven’t already, register to join us for Virtual Smart Buildings Week September 14th-18th, 2020! Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday during the lunch hour (12-1 pm PT) a virtual session will feature an engaging panel discussion covering smart buildings topics including Using Data and Analytics to Improve Performance, Grid Enabled Efficient Buildings, Achieving Persistent Operational Performance, and Creating Intelligent Spaces. These one-hour sessions each qualify for 1 Building Operator Certification (BOC) credential maintenance point and 0.10 IACET CEUs towards the renewal of industry certifications, certificates and licenses including but not limited to AIA, PE, LEED, IFMA, ASHRAE, and AEE.

Register Now!

Watch the Smart Buildings Week Welcome Address from Rimes Mortimer, General Manager of Industry Innovation at Microsoft Corporation.

 

Filed Under: Featured Event, SBX, Smart Buildings Week

Smart Buildings: Recommended Reading

August 26, 2020 By SBC staff

The following excerpts are from recent building technology and facility management articles that capture some of the topics and questions that will be addressed during SBC’s Virtual Smart Buildings Week September 14-18. Learn more about the session topics and speakers here: https://www.smartbuildingscenter.org/smart-buildings-week/ and register for the virtual series here: https://virtualsmartbuildingsweek.eventbrite.com.

Memoori Article: Dumb Buildings are the Real Losers in a post-COVID World
COVID-19 is one of the most disruptive events human society has experienced in the last 75 years. Beyond the struggles of 2020, this harsh reminder of the biological threats we face will go on to reshape the way we live for years to come. At the center of this debate is commercial real estate (CRE) — the indoor environments where people of different households gather — where 50% to 100% drops in occupancy levels have been common for months. CRE must now adapt to a post-COVID world that will create new winners and losers to reshape the buildings industry forever. Continue reading

BUILDINGS.com Article: Data-Driven Building Design That Gives More Than It Takes
HDR’s Regenerative Design Framework moves beyond basic high-performance design toward renewal-focused impacts and metric-driven targets for carbon, water, nutrients, air, biodiversity, societal and health categories. This holistic approach is intended to flex to accommodate design projects of all sizes, typologies and performance levels.

Understanding that even today’s high-performance buildings have a negative impact on the environment and their occupants, HDR believes it’s time for a collective leap toward a regenerative future, where design has a “net-positive” impact on the environment. Continue reading

 

Filed Under: SBC News, SBX, Smart Buildings Week

Announcing Fourth Smart Buildings Week Virtual Session: Creating Intelligent Spaces, September 18th

August 11, 2020 By SBC staff

We are excited to announce the fourth and final session for Virtual Smart Buildings Week on Friday, September 18th. This session on “Creating Intelligent Spaces” will close out the week of free lunch-hour sessions covering engaging topics including Using Data and Analytics to Improve Performance, Grid Enabled Efficient Buildings, and Achieving Persistent Operational Performance. These one-hour sessions each qualify for 1 Building Operator Certification (BOC) credential maintenance point and 0.10 IACET CEUs towards the renewal of industry certifications, certificates and licenses including but not limited to AIA, PE, LEED, IFMA, ASHRAE, and AEE. View the full Virtual Smart Buildings Week schedule and session descriptions here: https://www.smartbuildingscenter.org/smart-buildings-week/

Smart Buildings: Creating Intelligent Spaces
September 18th, 2020, 12:00 – 1:00 PM

The Internet of Things (IoT) is transforming the world, including the built environment. This transformation is already underway leading to improved organizational productivity, better space utilization, and more efficient and healthier buildings. To make this transformation successful, it’s important to both understand the technology and practices as well as the cross-organizational nature of adopting smart projects. Microsoft has keen insight here based on its own adoption of smart technologies at their buildings as well as through close working relationships with its partner ecosystem. Microsoft will share a number of key considerations that can help building owners and operators make a successful transformation to buildings that are more agile, flexible, efficient, and productive.


Speaker: Spyros Sakellariadis, Microsoft

Spyros is an IT professional focused on defining and developing innovative solutions that impact the way people do things. He’s currently working on smart buildings and places around facilities operations, occupancy, security, and all things sustainability – carbon/energy, water, and waste management – leveraging technologies like IoT, real time analytics, big data, field service/workforce management, and frontline worker support.

Spyros holds degrees from the University of Oxford (Physics and Philosophy) and Pittsburgh (History and Philosophy of Science), and has worked in many fields, including defense contracting, export trading, leasing, and AIDS research. He started a computer company aeons ago, sold it to Wang, went into Internet application hosting before it was a ‘thing’, and finally saw the light and joined Microsoft in 2003. Spyros has published multiple articles in trade journals, and holds several patents.

Register now for the engaging virtual panel discussions during Smart Buildings Week!

Filed Under: Featured Event, SBX, Smart Buildings Week

Virtual Smart Buildings Week Replaces In-Person SBX2020 Conference

July 14, 2020 By SBC staff


Due to the uncertainty surrounding holding large events during the COVID-19 pandemic and with the health, safety, and well-being of attendees as our top priority, the Smart Buildings Center is postponing the in-person Smart Buildings Exchange (SBX) Conference & Tradeshow until August 24th & 25th, 2021. The event will remain at the Bell Harbor Conference Center in downtown Seattle, and any tickets purchased for the 2020 dates will be honored for the 2021 dates or may be refunded. A special thank you to SBX event sponsors, Advisory Committee members, and session speakers for your understanding and flexibility as we make this shift. Although we are disappointed we are unable to hold the in-person event this year, we look forward to convening the industry in the summer of 2021 to cover the robust agenda topics we have developed while also enjoying outdoor socializing and networking.

In place of this year’s planned in-person event, we are hosting a free Virtual Smart Buildings Week September 14th-17th, 2020. Each day during the lunch hour, a virtual session crafted from key topics and speaker commitments for our planned in-person event will feature a lively and interactive panel discussion as outlined below. Registration for the first three virtual sessions on September 14th, 15th and 16th is now open and details for a fourth session on September 17th will be announced soon. These one-hour sessions each qualify for 1 Building Operator Certification (BOC) credential maintenance point and 0.10 IACET CEUs towards the renewal of industry certifications, certificates and licenses including but not limited to AIA, PE, LEED, IFMA, ASHRAE, and AEE.

Smart Buildings: Using Data and Analytics to Improve Performance
September 14th, 2020, 12:00 – 1:00 PM
This session brings together two leading local smart service providers and two facility directors who have real world experience bringing smart solutions to their buildings. Designing for optimal performance is no guarantee that it will happen. The ability to acquire system performance data is no guarantee that the data will trigger operational improvements. In these two case studies, buildings that should have been “top of their game” needed a new approach. Attendees will hear how ATS Automation and DB Engineering intervened to help facility directors collect relevant data from installed building systems, use analytical tools to provide insights into performance problems, and then – most importantly – help those facilities take action. The results speak for themselves. Improved energy performance that is persisting over time.

Moderator:

  • Stan Price, Smart Buildings Center

Panelists:

  • Pete Segall, ATS Automation
  • Trevor Sodorff, DB Engineering
  • Tim Wingert, CBRE
  • Keith Berkoben, Google

Smart Buildings: Grid Enabled (and Efficient) Buildings
September 15th, 2020, 12:00 – 1:00 PM
Grid enabled buildings (GEB) are equipped with technologies for load management that can respond to dynamic conditions in the electric grid. GEBs are generally more efficient (HVAC, lighting, envelope, appliances), connected (hardware and software), smart (data and analytics), and flexible (loads, generation, storage). In an environment where hardware is increasingly attractively priced and a plethora of data is available, building owners are able to provide a significant benefit to a utility’s growing portfolio of resources and play a creative role in meeting its resource capacity needs in real time and for the long term. GEBs also offer the owner the additional value proposition of taking more control of their utility costs.

An expert, national panel will describe the key features of GEBs and outline the value streams that accrue to both the building owner and the serving utility in creating this grid enabled relationship. The panel will discuss both the technology required to create a two-way communication condition as well as the cost and benefits to all the parties in making GEBs a reality.

Moderators:

  • Ben Levie, Seattle City Light; Mark Lenssen, Puget Sound Energy

Panelists:

  • Alexi Miller, New Buildings Institute
  • Cara Carmichael, Rocky Mountain Institute
  • Mark Frankel, Ecotope
  • Mary Ann Piette, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory

Smart Buildings: Achieving Persistent Operational Performance
September 16th, 2020, 12:00 – 1:00 PM
Facility energy performance and operations are often in direct conflict. It’s tough to hear, but the scales are not balanced for building owners or operators. Social pressure, building codes and new legislation are pushing EUI targets lower and lower. Advanced energy systems and smart building controls tease easy answers during initial design and construction, but the harsh reality is that designing an efficient building does not translate to operations success and often only adds to reactive practices, deferred maintenance and risk. In most cases, operators are not prepared to take on complicated building systems and new-to-them technologies. With inadequate training or resources, overtaxed staff override system settings to simply make it work. The result inadvertently drives up energy consumption and negates all efforts to optimize energy performance during design and construction while reducing asset life and introducing unnecessary risks.

The transition to smart and sustainable operations offers a best practice that balances the scales between energy expectations and operational realities. Panelists will outline proven approaches on actual projects that bridge design, build, train, optimize to ensure current energy requirements are effective and met.

Moderator:

  • Ric Cochrane, McKinstry

Panelists:

  • Mike Kowalick, South Landing EcoDistrict
  • Roy Buchert, Kaiser Permanente
  • Norm Menter, University of Washington

Register now for these engaging virtual panel discussions during Smart Buildings Week!

Filed Under: Education & Training, Featured Event, SBC News, SBX, Smart Buildings Week

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News & Articles

Tier 2 Rulemaking Kick-Off Webinar April 13th 10:30AM – 12PM

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Register for Certified Energy Manager Training at SBC, May 1st-5th

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Register for Mar 23 11-12, Clean Buildings General Question and Answer Session

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Estimating Your Building’s Emissions and Draft Targets for Proposed Seattle BEPS, Thursday Mar 23 12-1

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