One area where we are very excited about the potential of KSX is building automation. Specifically, optimization of energy consumption for large buildings. A great deal of work has been done to standardize the communication protocols used in building automation. This allows for complete integration of HVAC, lighting, network and communications and security systems in a way that hasn't been possible in the past. Much of the push for this unification was for HMI (human machine interfaces) and data logging but can be capitalized upon for optimization as well. KSX communicates with the outside world primarily through OPC, an industry standard communications protocol for process control. Much effort has been made to make OPC the "glue" to bind together both new and legacy automation systems. There are OPC servers available for virtually any device, PLC, DCS or communications bus that you can think of. Imagine you have a building with Metasys N2 devices, BacNet devices, Modbus devices and communications gear enabled with SNMP. All of these networks and buses can be unified onto a supervisory network using OPC.

An optimization strategy using crisp and fuzzy logic, neural network models and genetic algorithm optimizers can easily be created in KSX. A strategy can be created to control HVAC set points depending on the time of year and time of day(when will sunlight hit the building), weather forecast, usage patterns, energy cost schedules etc. KSX's hierarchical and distributed nature is perfect for optimizing energy consumption in buildings and groups of buildings. It is the ultimate tool for organizations that manage many buildings because it allows individual buildings to manage and optimize themselves, yet still be linked together for remote maintenance, reporting and visualization. See my previous posts on distributed computing with KSX for more information on distributed systems. For a more detailed treatment of a specific office temperature optimization strategy see my post on just-in-time temperature set point control.