The City of Amsterdam standardizes on mbNET for remote interventions and management of its buildings
In the industry, we may find machines that have been working for ten, twenty, sometimes thirty years or more. However, when we talk about buildings in a city, we’re on a very different scale. What’s a decade or two when some buildings can be centuries old?
Of course, nowadays, whether old or new, most buildings are equipped with modern HVAC systems and building owners like to keep those related costs under control. It is therefore very useful to be able to manage them from one central location and this is where it all started a few years ago already.
Amongst the buildings of the City of Amsterdam, you could find a variety of HVAC systems from companies such as Priva, Siemens or Schneider Electric. Some were equipped with remote access capabilities, some were not and it was difficult to keep track of what remote maintenance system should be used for what building.
The City of Amsterdam was looking for a solution to standardise HVAC remote management of its buildings, in such a way that would be both compatible with its tight IT security requirements whilst remaining easy to install & operable by non IT specialists. That is the challenge given to O.p.m. bv when they started the project.
Specializing in the provision of HVAC systems, O.p.m. bv takes care of the electric cabinets and the control part of HVAC installations. The company operates in the mid-size market segment, supplying factories, offices & control rooms the world over with flexibility and rapid response, creating tailor-made solutions for each of their customers.
When O.P.M. bv initially introduced the MB connect line solution to the City of Amsterdam, it went through a series of approval rounds, with nominated IT specialists as well as the people who would eventually use it for HVAC systems maintenance.
It is indeed rarely the owner of the buildings who takes care of the maintenance, more often this is subcontracted to a third party and the building owner delegates access rights to the relevant supplier. Invariably, this leads to a lot of people having access and a lot of installations to manage. A nightmare to organize and preserve the security and the integrity of the whole system.
After having successfully passed the IT evaluation and security penetration tests, the building management team approved the solution based on its overall versatility and the flexibility of its user access control.
Today, the MB solution is being deployed in all buildings, old and new, and the same hardware even serves USB controllers or legacy ones with only a serial port. Each controller is able to raise an alarm notification, through a DI onboard the router, which automatically call the operator for attention.
Third party suppliers accesses are now much better managed through the built in user access control, where users can only access the necessary components through a “hop service” with only keyboard and mouse events being passed to the component website or VNC server. Users can interact with the component without really having access to the site network. Network access is only given to specific users, where and when they need it.
“A well-managed building is a building where it becomes easy to make energy savings”, says Marco Frank, owner of O.P.M. bv. regel- en besturingstechniek “This tailor-made solution is very useful, especially now, in these times of pandemic and confinement, as you can control all systems, even legacy installations, and make corrections & optimizations, according to the actual occupancy, all from your home office. You make energy savings while preserving the safety of staff and the buildings security.”
About O.P.M. bv regel- en besturingstechniek
Headquartered in Haarlem, The Netherlands, O.P.M. bv regel- en besturingstechniek is specialized in Building Automation technology. The company is active in the fields of industrial controls and building management, taking care of complete projects or only specific parts of it as subcontractor, and offers guidance and consultancy services too.
O.P.M. bv can take care or your projects from the desing to the selection and delivery of the field equipment, including the programming of the control devices and the cabling of the cabinet, in accordance with the applicable standards and regulations.
