Training is going to be a key component in creating the sustainable buildings of the future - as many buildings have gotten away with a lack of that investment in the past but the demands being placed on operational teams today are too difficult to manage without new help.
Above is a quick screenshot that illustrates the need for proper operational training and understanding within buildings. In this example, you can "see" the day of a technician and their response to complaints around comfort.
Tech comes into the building and receives a complaint that the space is too cold. The tech wants to put out the fire and assume the system is working so they increase the temperature setpoint of the space to make it warmer. The data above shows that this effort was wasted as the system was unable to hit the mark on the lower/previous setpoint.
A couple of hours go by and there has been no change to the space that would warm it up so the technician receives an additional complaint and they take action by making another change to a setpoint and this time it was to airflow. Much like the temperature, the system was not able to meet the lower "designed" setpoint so the increase has no effect as the damper (not shown) is locked out at 100% open.
One full day goes by without any action and the issue remains present. I am sure at this point the over-tasked facility team is just trying to find a quick way to help so the airflow setpoint is raised again with again no effect.
This is a nice visualization of what happens in buildings every day and it is NOT because the teams operating them do not care. It is because there has not been an "easy" way or methodology shown to them that has positively impacted their day-to-day. The real issue in the above example, but kept off due to screen real estate, was a low "delta" across the heating coil that was fully active during the data sample. This repair was beyond the on-prem facilities team to accomplish and that's ok! At least they are armed with the knowledge that this issue requires outside support and the only issue is that we could have gotten there prior to steps 1, 2, and 3 taking place.
I want to create an environment in which teams have on-demand resources to reduce their daily stress and allow them to take time back and accomplish their goals. We can get there but it will take effort and lots of training!
Comments