Why does BACnet matter for building owners? Your (non-technical) breakdown on the benefits of BACnet

Monica McMahen, Director of Marketing, Optigo Networks

At Optigo, we spend so much time neck-deep in networking, building automation, and BACnet, it’s easy to forget most of the world doesn’t think much about BBMDs and MS/TP.

If you’re a building owner, you don’t really care about the nuts and bolts of your network. You care that your building is comfortable, safe, and secure for your tenants, and that the technology won’t be obsolete in five years.

As the future of smart buildings comes at us faster and faster, we have to design our systems carefully. We have to build on a strong foundation, with robust platforms that can grow and adapt. Right now, BACnet is the definitive solution for flexible, scalable architectures. But why does it matter for the building owners out there?

Let me break it down for you in very simple, non-technical terms. Here’s why you should care about BACnet.
________________________________________

First, and perhaps most importantly, BACnet is dominant in the industry. It’s being adopted in more and more buildings for more and more systems around the world. It’s particularly common on campuses — both corporate and academic — and in commercial real estate. This prevalence means you can count on getting BACnet products from just about every vendor out there. In fact, I don’t think there’s a manufacturer that doesn’t provide BACnet solutions nowadays. You have a ton of options, and you can choose what’s best for your building.

Another reason you should care about BACnet is, your facility managers need your support and buy-in. There’s a lot that you can do with a BACnet system: you can save money, improve energy, and empower your teams to do more with less. Because you can run so many systems on BACnet nowadays, it’s possible to understand all your data as a bigger picture. But your facility managers need your support. There are far too many teams out there who manage their buildings with pieced together spreadsheets and cheap (or very, very expensive) tools that aren’t even designed for building automation. They’re constantly backlogged and playing catch-up. They need you to invest in powerful solutions that will allow them to establish preventative maintenance and create truly intelligent systems.

[an error occurred while processing this directive]Finally, BACnet is an infrastructure you can really build on for the future. BACnet/IP, in particular, is the future of our buildings. It supports the Building Internet of Things and connectivity in a way that other protocols — and even BACnet MS/TP — just don’t. If you want to be able to grow your network with intelligent lighting, heating and ventilation, security, waste management, and more, BACnet’s the best-suited for the job. Arming yourself with information about why you should invest in the protocol will help you make informed decisions for the future of your building, rather than focusing on price tradeoffs.

Interested in learning more? Check out our whitepaper on why you should invest in BACnet, featuring interviews with Automated Buildings’ own Ken Sinclair, PolarSoft Inc.’s David Fisher, and Penn State University’s Tom Walker.