BMS Integration
Triacta PowerHawk® meters were designed for Intelligent Buildings and Building Management System (BMS) integration. Every PowerHawk has BMS protocols built-in, right out of the box. All PowerHawk meters support MODBUS TCP. The 6X12 and 6X03 series meters support BACnet/IP as well.
- Interface with building management systems to monitor energy use at building, unit or equipment level
- Fast installation for new construction or retrofits
- Native IP connectivity through built-in Ethernet port or via communications modules (V.90 modem, 802.11n WIFI, or Power Line Carrier)
- MODBUS® TCP and BACnet®/IP protocols for building automation integration
PowerHawk meters connect directly to IT infrastructure and business applications via FTP, without requirement for any on site servers.
The Intelligent Building
There is a rapid transition happening in the property management world. The past decade has proven the conventional wisdom that investing in properties to make them “green” provides a quick return on investment by lowering operating costs, increasing property value, and raising tenancy rates.
Today the term “green building” is giving way to “intelligent building”, recognizing that the fundamental characteristic of a green building is the liberal application of control, monitoring, and measurement systems. These systems are designed to maintain buildings within a tight operating window, exposing operational characteristics to all stakeholders while identifying deviations and areas for improvement.
Metering and the Intelligent Building
Intelligent Buildings have changed traditional building automation “table stakes” by integrating Building Management Systems with IT systems and metering platforms to provide a unified system with a much more detailed picture of a building's state.
The primary goal of the BMS is control and alarm response. IT systems add business applications to the mix, exposing vital information to a broader audience of stakeholders than BMS's normally do. A metering platform combined with an Energy Management System (EMS) fulfills the critical role of providing increased metering and monitoring accuracy, datalogging, and enhanced circuit coverage.
Metering platforms are essential to understanding the use of energy within a building and are a critical part of an Intelligent Building. This extends to other services such as water and natural gas that, when combined with electricity, roll up to provide an accurate picture of a building’s carbon footprint.
Open protocols ensure a future proof solution
Building Management Systems are naturally evolving towards this new reality by embracing Internet Protocol (IP), the communications standard of IT. BMS communications have migrated from simple RS-485 serial token exchange networks to IP-based LANs, as demonstrated by BACnet/IP and MODBUS TCP.
PowerHawk meters can be leveraged by Building Management Systems to the best of their abilities while opening the door to other systems that may be better suited to providing functions such as:
- Meter management (including configuration and firmware updates)
- Energy management (including dashboards, performance management, benchmarking and alarms)
- Green House Gas (GHG) management
- Transactions across the Smart Grid Energy Services Interface for collaboration with Utility programs
- Billing or cost allocation
Fast and efficient integration
PowerHawk meters allow direct, simultaneous connection to Building Management Systems over BACnet/IP or MODBUS TCP while also communicating directly with IT systems over FTP.
All meter data is available via a built-in Ethernet port — including data-logged interval data as well as accumulated register values. BMS's can access the meters in asynchronous bursts without fear of data loss. Data remains available and accessible in the meter in the event of a issues in BMS.
PowerHawk API’s and feature sets are consistent across the entire PowerHawk meter family, making integration with building management and IT systems a snap while allowing for the right density multi-circuit submeter in any situation.
Some of the building management systems that PowerHawk meters have been integrated with include:
- Cisco® Building Mediator®
- Tridium® Niagara AX®
- Geist® Environet®
- Schneider Electric® ION Enterprise™
Each PowerHawk meter has native IP connectivity through a built-in Ethernet port or via communications modules (V.90 modem, 802.11n WIFI, or Power Line Carrier). PowerHawk meters have DHCP, meaning they do not require difficult to manage static IP addresses. Further IT friendly features include the ability to push meter data to a server within the building or to the web “cloud” via FTP. All communications with the server are initiated by the meter, enhancing security by not requiring any special firewall considerations.
