• • • SMART BUILDINGS & I0T • • •
CREATE VALUE WITH MORE INTEGRATION IN BUILDING AUTOMATION CONTROLLERS
Building automation systems (BAS) integrate lighting, energy, HVAC, safety, and security into a single intuitive system, balancing the optimum efficiency of the building’s operation with the productivity and comfort of its occupants, says Michal Raninec, a systems applications engineer at Analog Devices
W
hile the building automation market is very conservative, it has seen considerable growth mostly driven by rising energy prices, increasing awareness regarding energy conservation, and growing government initiatives in areas of fire safety and security. New standards and regulations, such as the UL 217 standard for smoke alarms, have taken effect to make buildings safer, more efficient, and more comfortable. Trends like these stimulate the development of new building automation products and solutions, pushing manufacturers to deliver new technology in shorter development cycles. This change of pace creates op- portunities for BAS companies to meet these needs with flexible system solutions that are platformised offering lower power and smaller size. Building automation controllers are a typical exam- ple of a product that often lacks the innovative agility so valued in today’s fast-changing markets. The con- trollers are the brains of the BAS. They take the data from the sensors deployed throughout the building and execute the system’s response. That means the controllers need to have a certain number of input and output channels.
Traditionally, building automation controllers have used discrete implementations for both fixed and configurable channels. However, the bill of materials (BOM) of discretely implemented configurable chan- nel controllers can include hundreds of components. After years of development, the discrete solutions have become very efficient and optimised to reduce BOM cost in order to match the expectations of this cost-sensitive market. Nonetheless, new trends and more demand for agile development underline some major drawbacks of this approach, such as the complexity of the planning, design, production, and logistics of too many product variants in the building automation controllers. Therefore, the BAS solutions must be assessed based on total cost of ownership rather than on a simplified BOM cost point of view.
INTEGRATED VERSUS DISCRETE
The ability to reconfigure the channel as required is
the right approach to eliminate unused channels, but this alone does not address the other shortcomings of controller design. The key concept is the integra- tion that enables the channel design to be simplified, with a smaller footprint and better performance. With an integrated solution, the function of any channel can be easily configured using software commands. Software-configurable input/output (I/O) technology opens up possibilities of easy design reuse and platformisation that ultimately reduce the total cost of ownership of a BAS solution and create value throughout the product life cycle of the building auto- mation controllers (see figure 1).
The first stage of a controller development is the system architecture. At this point, all the customer requirements are considered and a new product is defined. The inflexibility of a discrete solution is a notable disadvantage even in this early phase of development. Various needs of the customers—for instance, the ratio or the number of input and output channels—may lead to multiple designs, which increases the cost and hinders agile responses to market needs. Integrated, software-configurable I/O enables the platformisation and reusability of a proven design in different applications. Reusability is
10 ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING • SEPTEMBER 2021
essential for reducing design and production cost, as discussed later in this article.
Following the product definition, the design kicks off. In this phase, the design reuse fully reveals its importance. Unlike discrete realisation, the integrated and configurable I/O enables quick iterations, reduces time, and frees up valuable resources. In both hard- ware and software design, the shift from resource-in- tensive, lengthy, multiple product variant developments toward a single design fulfilling numerous require- ments reduces R&D time and cost while maintaining high reliability and robustness of a proven architecture. Meeting the needs of different applications is much easier with the “any function on any pin” approach of an integrated, reconfigurable design (see figure 2).
CONCLUSION
To tackle the shortcomings of a discrete design, Analog Devices created the AD74412R, a fully soft- ware-configurable I/O. It integrates the discrete signal chain in a single chip and provides four fully configur- able channels.
The AD74412R creates value throughout the con- troller life cycle, from product definition, through de- sign and production, to installation and operation.
electricalengieneeringmagazine.co.uk
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