Responding to changing demands on our buildings – without compromising performance
Sector: Building Services
Challenge: Optimising performance
Today’s buildings are being used in ever new ways. They are designed to serve people, and people are constantly changing how and when they use buildings. The challenge for planners and consultants, when designing and upgrading buildings, is how to achieve high performance whilst reducing operating costs. Alongside this are considerations around environmental impact, ensuring reliability and customising solutions that can adapt to meet changing usage requirements. Finding ways to monitor and map services that can support such flexibly varied usage is a real challenge for building owners and demands intelligent systems that can adapt to ever changing requirements.
Nowhere more critical for intelligent smart water management is within building services. From responsive heating and cooling systems that adjust according to environmental conditions, to intelligent wastewater pumping systems capable of self-cleaning, optimising performance across a building’s water cycle means finding solutions that are smart enough to constantly adjust to different conditions, wherever they impact across a site’s life cycle, development cycle or water cycle.
In an unprecedented era of change, with remote working now the norm along with a unique need for adequate space and ventilation, it is more important than ever that designers, developers and building managers harness the smart options available to ensure flexibility and resilience across the sector.
With Xylem’s future-facing product portfolio, developed around the challenges faced by our customers and designed for optimised performance, we also value the human expertise to identify the right solution for each unique application, and to deliver the service and maintenance fleets which ensure optimal performance over a system’s life cycle.
Design to adapt
Building Information Modelling (BIM) has brought about the digital transformation of the construction sector. It’s here that decision intelligence can work to the advantage of customers seeking the most energy-efficient, adaptive, water-conservative solutions available.
As well as taking carbon footprint and operational efficiency into account, owners and investors can achieve greater return with more detailed building plans that predict – and meet – future needs. With BIM, planners and consultants can plan a resilient building that can adapt as necessary and design a digital simulation of how the system will act, with the help of data from components such as pumps.
Adjust to new HVAC needs
Smart HVAC systems must be able to adjust to changing conditions throughout the day: differing climatic conditions, or the number of people can mean differing requirements. Heat meters can measure temperature and energy flow, making it easy to understand conditions within the building and to respond. For specifiers focused on efficient systems that provide the highest amount of uptime with the lowest energy consumption, such intelligent performance can make a significant impact on the bottom line for owners.
As the way we use our buildings changes, with less travel and shifting work and usage patterns in buildings, digital remote monitoring solutions and smart analysis of usage can ensure HVAC systems still operate at their optimum performance. Digital operating models can also enable operators and owners to optimise the use of their assets, making them more efficient and reliable – in the most convenient and flexible manner whilst achieving the lowest possible costs across the life cycle.
Xylem can also ensure legacy installations are future-proof with the option of upgrading systems to cope with new demands, or retrofitting solutions to meet current requirements.
Flex to demand
New surges in demand require a flexible approach as we move towards post-pandemic life with solutions available that can adjust according to demand. For example, we offer booster sets with variable frequency drives that speed up or slow down the pump depending on water requirements.
For larger buildings like commercial buildings or apartment blocks, sub-metering can help to apportion water usage fairly and accurately according to these changing needs.
Ground water or rainwater can be used for separate water cycles like flushing toilets, irrigation or fountains to decrease the clean water consumption of buildings and maximise efficiency and performance. Xylem offers a wide portfolio of submersible pumping solutions to transport and boost water from tanks and wells for supplementary water supplies.
Out of sight is not out of mind
Wastewater management is the most sensitive and critical aspect for any building operation. This is becoming even more challenging as many commercial office blocks adapt to a more hybrid model post-Covid. Flexible systems that can adapt to the different conditions in real time can be a huge advantage when the cost and reputation implications of a pumping failure is considered. For example, intelligent pumping systems can help avoid expensive downtime with self-cleaning sumps along with anti-block technology.
Xylem can work with you to create tailored systems to accommodate the changing needs and optimise performance to minimise the risks of failure of a sensitive wastewater system.
Safety first
In any fire suppression system, from automatic sprinklers to stand pipe systems, reliable products are crucial. For optimal and flexible performance, clean water booster sets can be incorporated with sprinkler systems to ensure correct pressure when there is demand at multiple points across different floors. Nowhere more vital is smart water management to ensure a pumping system can meet the many variable situations, locations and applications to safeguard a building and its occupants.
All change!
We know that the world we live in has changed dramatically in the past 12 months – and building systems are on the frontline as the spaces and places we occupy, live and work in need to stay abreast of those changes without compromising on performance.
Design intelligence, high performance technology, digital tools for condition monitoring, servicing and maintenance expertise are all critical to the optimised management of a building. Only by understanding and anticipating what the future may bring, and taking the correct steps to adapt and accommodate to the complex shifting landscape in domestic and commercial building usage, will we begin to deliver the solutions that can optimise performance and create reliably efficient buildings with the lowest water usage and carbon footprint.
Get in touch to find out more about Xylem’s smart building services solutions.