Buildings consume a tremendous amount of natural resources and are a major contributor to the carbon and water footprints of cities. In the USA, commercial buildings account for 18.4% of energy used and are the fastest growing segment. There is a significant opportunity to optimize energy management while meeting the needs of diverse users.

Building owners are faced with operating cost pressures, the need to provide a healthy work environment, competition from LEED or ENERGY STAR certified properties, new sustainability goals and regulation all movtivating an increase in efficiency and sustainability of their property assets. But existing automation solutions are often taxed in managing an increasingly complex environment and face challenges to provide an integrated view of the complete building system.

Building managers can be overwhelmed by the volume of data now available on building assets and need better tools to analyze trends and detect deteriorating building conditions to enable proactive maintenance and on-going commissioning activities.

There is also the opportunity to move to proactive management of building resources utilizing real-time building data together with weather forecasts, understanding of occupant load and changing energy prices to create significant energy cost savings, energy usage reductions and diminished carbon impact.

To meet the challenges facing facilities management today, we have to go from looking at a building as a collection of electrical and mechanical equipment to looking at a building holistically as a complex system that generates enormous quantities of data that can be mined and modeled to dramatically improve performance.

At Callida we are developing holistic building optimization solutions to increase efficiency and meet sustainability goals while ensuring occupant comfort using smart algorithms.