Building Management System architecture

for large building automation systems

Grzegorz Hayduk, Paweá Kwasnowski, Zbigniew MikoĞ

Department of Power Electronics and Energy Control Systems
AGH University of Science and Technology
Kraków, Poland
[hayduk,kwasn,mikos]@agh.edu.pl

Abstract—The paper presents a concept of Building The comfort means providing optimal conditions of indoor
Management System (based on SCADA/HMI system) for thermal parameters and indoor air quality (CO2 and humidity)
buildings with large scale automation system. and parameters of indoor lighting of workplace and common
areas. The security means to execute a functionality of
The concept foundation is to build a control system database occupancy monitoring, controlling who has access to
as an extension of Building Information Modelling (BIM) protected areas of the building and alarming by I&HAS
database, which contains definition of automation system and (Intruder & Hold-up Alarm System). In many chemical or
technological infrastructure controlled by the automation.
biological laboratories equipped with fume cupboards, it is
Second foundation of the concept is to enforce a set of rules used
in building automation commissioning phase and BMS system
also required to balance air of supply and exhaust air between
construction phase, which ensures coherence between automation HVAC air handling unit and local extraction fans, to maintain
subsystems. The feature with distinguishes the concept from the specific under-pressure.
concept used for office space buildings is to allow for unlimited Equally important goal of building automation is to ensure
number of individual room configurations. The office space operation according to declared energy efficiency class (e.g.
rooms fall usually in small number of types, whereas presented defined in EN-15232 standard – Energy performance of
concept supports buildings with large amount of non-standard
buildings – Impact of Building Automation, Controls and
laboratories of different technological requirements, for which
Building Management). With regard to the efficiency class,
neither standard automation systems, nor BMS systems don’t
fulfill all requirements.
one of requirements for building automation is integration of
all building functions, installations, directly on the field level,
Proposed in the paper concept for BMS system was usually in one coherent control network.
successfully implemented in several university buildings with
didactic rooms and research laboratories, verifying presented B. Building Information Modelling (BIM)
concept. Currently it is widely known, but still in many countries
barely gaining understanding among architects and building
Keywords—Building Management System; Building
sectors professionals, the initiative to introduce a design
Information Model; SCADA-HMI
process named Building Information Modelling. One of its
definition (by US National Building Information Model
I. INTRODUCTION Standard Project Committee) states, that BIM "… is a digital
The paper presents a methodology of process for design, representation of physical and functional characteristics of a
implementation and operation of Building Management facility. A BIM is a shared knowledge resource for
System, built with commercial, industrial grade SCADA/HMI, information about a facility forming a reliable basis for
for commercial buildings equipped with large scale decisions during its life-cycle; defined as existing from earliest
automation. The methodology has several points in common conception to demolition." In other words, BIM is to build a
with a process known as Building Information Modelling database of building construction and its infrastructure details,
(BIM) and is a proposition of extending the BIM concept. as an extension of the architectural design alone for additional
“dimensions”, such as cost and time. Then, the BIM database
A. Building automation systems can be used by all players participating in making building
construction, equipment, automation, its commissioning and
Most basic criteria for building automation operation for maintenance. The BIM database must be updated during
commercial buildings are to ensure comfort for users and whole commissioning phase to correspond to real building
security of the building, by controlling building technological construction and its infrastructure.
infrastructure, while minimizing energy consumption.

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 One of goals and advantages of applying BIM concept is approaches, requires to use a database tools and additional
automatic consistency of data. This ensures, that every effort on rules design. The methodology is based on (1) a
“object” in the building has single definition (as in SPOT rule database (the RDBMS engine does not matter here) which
– Single Point Of Truth). Therefore adding another property holds specification of building technological infrastructure and
(e.g. luminaires) to the room object, makes it to be added to all specification of control system, and (2) a set of rules for
other properties of the room, instead of creating a fork of the processing the database. The methodology ensures elimination
main building project and filling it with luminaries (as it is in of human errors of manual creation and modification of
todays practice). It is also worth stressing out, that BIM is not repetitive elements. A consequences of such methodology is,
a 3D drawing instead of 2D drawing, but BIM is about among others, automatic (using rules) validation of building
objects, their types, instances and attributes, put into a infrastructure specification consistency. The BMS system is
database with consistency checks. implemented in a powerful enough SCADA/HMI solution.
Because BIM database has to be a basis for making
decisions about the building during whole its lifecycle, another A. Rules – an overview
dimension is being introduced to BIM model – a time. It is In paper [1] a rules sets are presented, for effective control
another requirement in BIM thinking, that BIM has to be alive implementation. First rule set ensures indoor comfort
together with the building, being passed on from architect, conditions, and second rule set concerns energy efficiency. It
designer, general contractor to the building owner or manager. may be noticed that the rules have different goals and it is not
Then all changes, modernizations in the building may be easy to fulfill both goals at the same time. The methodology
easily tracked on time axis, including costs of maintenance in presented here, also employs rules, but for processing building
any given period or ROI indicators. As such, BIM is excellent infrastructure data and related automation system and then (1)
tool for Facility Management executives. build supervisory system, (2) validate consistency of the data
and (3) support BMS operation with functions that require
C. Traditional BMS design approaches correlations between different areas of building infrastructure,
areas of building automation, such as monitoring, control and
Traditionally, supervisory BMS systems are designed with reporting.
two approaches. First one is to create every item (tag or data
point or variable, visualization graphic, etc.) separately or
duplicating similar elements required number of times and B. Lifecycle phases for building automation and its BMS
manually modifying all required parameters. The parameters As it was presented on Fig. 1 of [2], a lifecycle of the
refer to field level communication, alarming, historical building can be divided to phases: design phases (sensors
archiving, reporting, etc. Such approach is very vulnerable to definition, templates definition) and then a phase without
errors and mistakes of manual creation or modification of the human intervention – automatic operation, a control algorithm
items. Furthermore, later on, when some change or extension execution.
needs to be applied, it also must be made manually which is
very error prone.
Second traditional approach goes one step further from
first one and includes ability to use templates. First, a
configurable template is made, which afterwards is used to
generate the items (variables, graphic objects). But the
templates are only configurable with their parameters. Later
on, instead of creating single items, a template can be
instantiated and their parameters might be manually, one by Fig. 1. Phases of BMS creation and lifecycle
one, filled in. It is less time-consuming and less error prone
process than in the first approach, but still plenty of The methodology being presented here, covers similar
parameters must be filled in manually and the templates also phases: design, commissioning and operation/maintenance.
must be instantiated manually. But having in mind modernizations and expansions which
occur in practice, the Fig. 1, also shows a case where all
Practically none of the above approaches requires nor uses phases (in small scale) mix with operation phase later on,
some sort of database specifying building rooms, areas, during building lifecycle. It is consistent with the statement,
infrastructure, functionality and related automation features that BIM database must be updated all the time, along with
such as controller devices, their variables, physical units, building life. In the concept, Fig. 1 presents details of all the 8
resolutions, control algorithm types, their parameters, etc. The phases, explained below:
approaches also don’t have a place to define correlations
between controllers operating in different building automation 1. Bld def db – design of the database holding definitions
subsystems (e.g. lighting and metering). of the building and its infrastructure; the phase can be
coupled with BIM model, if the model would be
II. BMS SYSTEM DESIGN METHODOLOGY created by building construction team.
2. Aut db – design of database for building automation
With respect to the above, the main goal of this paper is to definitions, coupled with the previous definitions about
present a methodology of effective design, commissioning and
building infrastructure.
execution of BMS system, which in contrast to traditional

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 3. Rules dev – development of rules for processing of for sharing occupancy with lighting and HVAC for realization
above databases and validation of their consistency. of comfort and energy efficiency function.
4. Net dev – generation of network communication For the example building, master information for single
definitions in supervisory system (communication with room was shown in Tab. I. These are (1) identification data for
building automation controllers). room and (2) names of devices in automation system (which
5. Pdb – (Process db for SCADA) – generation of tags are fully sufficient for its unambiguous identification in
which make SCADA process database. control network) followed by index of device’ network
6. HMI – rules-aided development of GUI and variable sets, which provide instance of algorithm in the
visualization, device. Further data are stored in another slave tables of the
7. Control – development of BMS supervisory control database, and in the processing rules, which exactly define
layer (algorithms, group and scheduler control), meaning of values in the tables and assure correlation with
8. Operation – automation and supervisory systems run other attributes, e.g. setpoint temperature of air handling unit.

TABLE I. EXAMPLE ROOM DEFINITION RECORD 2) Rule sets for processing

Looking at Tab. I, one can see that for this room one
Field (property) Example fancoil is defined and name of the device is FCU_5202 and its
Room symbol 5-205 algorithm index for variables is 1. The processing rules (3:
Room name (FMC) pracownia EIP Rules dev) will check, if that instance of algorithm is not
Floor, segment 2, C5.3
Occupancy (ctrl. alg.) FCU_5205/1
defined for other room, throw an error if it is, otherwise the
Occupancy (autonomous) <none> rule defines, that in BMS variables should be created for:
KD_5205/KD+EZ+PAOD+
Gate configuration
KON+SSWiN
• space temperature (from FCU device if there are no
Temperature, humidity HSM_5205 HSM device, otherwise from HSM),
Wall module Yes, IP: -.-.-.143 • operation modes of fancoil – preset and effective
Fancoils FCU_5205/1 (as standby, econo, comfort, forced),
Room lighting (facade IRC_5205/1 (no), • monitoring and override of fan speed,
mode) IRC_5205/2 (yes)
symbol: O.1, type: T
• monitoring and override of cool and heat valves,
platform: C5.2 • setpoint temperatures for heating and cooling in all
Roof fans – no 1
box: 3.0, power: 2.75 kW four modes of fancoil operation,
ctrl: DLC_SO3_D1/3 • monitoring wall module temperature setpoint and fan
state: DLC_SO3_D2/2
failure: DLC_SO3_D2/1
speed,
Humidifier (permit, state, • occupancy timeout for comfort mode.
<none>
failure):
Cooler (valve) AION_5205_D1/2
The rule provides automatic generation of SCADA
Digestorium: <none> communication drivers configuration (4:Net dev) and tags of
HVAC econo mode: DLC_5205_D2/3 SCADA system, alarm areas, historian definitions, groups of
Reagents cupboards exhaust
AION_5205_D1/2
tags with assignment to building area, etc. (5:Pdb dev)
(state, failure)
Supply temperature: AION_5207_D1/1 Further rules specify, that a graphical object has to be
Water meters: WD2.3C, WD2.3Z automatically created on the visualization (6: HMI dev) at
Heat meter: C5_G_11LH position specified by AutoCAD drawing or BIM database. The
Cool meter: C5_G_11LC object will present the space temperature, fan speed, operation
Electric meter: R2C5-L1, R2C5-L2
mode, valves status and:
Air Handling Unit: Lab5.2
1) Building and automation database contents • will allow to show detailed fancoil control panel with
The model contains a database of the building all its details of operation, etc.
technological installations and its automation (1:Bld inf db i • will allow to set alarm thresholds for space
2:Aut db). It contains data about rooms itself, their function temperature and allocate a space in the database for
(type), but also presence of specific installation which requires the thresholds,
automation, together with detailed attributes of the automation • record space temperature, fan mode and valves state in
operation. The data are assigned to definitions of rooms and historical archive.
common areas (corridors, staircases, halls, etc.). For example,
in case of access control subsystem, the data specify if the gate In the scope of the last development phase (7:Control), the
(door) has equipment (APAS – access point actuators and rules satisfy requirements of scheduling and group control. For
sensors) only on external side or on both sides, if it is a sluice both, there have to be separate types for different types of
or usual door, does it have emergency (fire) open button (often field-level device variable. For group control, the assignment
as break-glass type boxes), a reed for monitoring door open to room and its area is required, to allow e.g. for setting
state, electric door lock, occupancy sensor and I&HAS setpoint values for single room, group of rooms, all rooms at
functionality. If the automation is correctly implemented, there given floor or whole building.
will be relation between Occupancy and Gate fields exactly
for occupancy and I&HAS correlation. The same will be true

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 After execution of all above rules, the BMS is III. CONCLUSIONS
automatically correlated with field-level automation, building Feature which distinguishes presented concept from the
infrastructure and ready for phase 8:Operation. one used in many office buildings is to enable unlimited
number of individual room configurations. Installations and
C. Other infrastructure of the building automation of office rooms in a given building usually fall
It must be noticed, that not all automation functions in the into just few categories, whereas presented concept supports
building are correlated with single rooms or even groups of buildings with plenty of individual laboratories with different
rooms. Cooling installation, municipal heat supply rooms, technological requirements, for which neither standard
outdoor environment monitoring (temperature, humidity, automation system, nor standard supervisory BMS system,
light), monitoring and alarming of electrical distribution will not fulfill all individual requirements. As presented in
boxes, parking barriers, heating of roof gutters, façade lighting Tab. I, every functionality together with number of
or even outdoor lighting – these are examples of installations technological infrastructure items of the room, can be put into
which also are embraced by the building automation and get a BIM-like database holding requirements to create the BMS
integrated in common control network. As such, they also system.
must be controlled by the same BMS system and correlated
Advantages of presented concept are emphasized in
with e.g. electricity meters. For such non-room cases, separate
buildings equipped with Smart Metering subsystem. As an
database tables, with slightly different structure than presented
example, Centrum Energetyki AGH building can be given,
in Tab. I, is implemented. However, the methodology of
with few hundreds of various meters (electricity, water, heat
applying rules which specify what operations have to be
and cool) or two buildings in Science and Technology Park
executed to create all required BMS/SCADA items, and to
verify consistency of whole data in building and automation Euro-Centrum (PNT), equipped in nearly 100 electricity
specification database, stays at the same level as for the meters (in [3] details of the Smart Metering installation were
rooms. presented). When this type of system gets BMS compliant
with BIM database, it is possible to correlate automation data
with energy consumption data. Ideas which arise elsewhere, to
D. Rules implementation build behavioral profiles of the users based on energy
Presented above in section B. example, was implemented consumption profiles, or detection of events in such trends [4],
in VBA which provides automation of Proficy iFIX object support correlation with automation data recorded by BMS.
model. It may be also any other programming language,
suitable for the particular SCADA object model. For other Proposed in the paper concept for BMS system was
SCADA products with VSTA technology it may be VB .Net successfully implemented in several university buildings in
or C# and for another one it may be even Python or Lua. Kraków. One example is a building supervised by SCADA
which contains over 14800 tags, visualized on over 290
In the same way, for all other functions and installations of screens. The building schedule controls over 3000 tags of 22
the building, slave tables and rule sets were implemented as types (e.g. setpoint temperature, common lighting mode, AHU
procedures of chosen SCADA. economy mode, etc.). The control network of the building
contains 1290 devices connected with 39 local TP-FT/10
E. Requirements for SCADA networks. This confirms, that the presented concept is valid
A condition for successful implementation of presented and allows for successful advanced BMS system development.
concept, is to choose SCADA system which allows to
implement rules as procedures in its automation language. The References
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