FADRS Overview

How Facilities Participate

A curtailment plan is developed by the CSP and FADRS^® engineers and your facilities engineers. This plan will determine what equipment can participate in response to a call for a demand response "event." When such an event is called, FADRS^® receives an Internet based signal from the CSP, the utility, or the ISO. FADRS^® then takes control of your Building Automation System (BAS), which may include one, two or multiple disparate systems on the same campus, and using the curtailment plan slows down, turns off or resets existing electrical loads that are not absolutely necessary to the proper functioning of the end user's facility. The amount of advance notice, frequency and duration of the events depends on the program(s) in which you elect to enroll.

FADRS™ Automates Participation

By working with the facilities personnel for a building and understanding the operational needs, and sensitivities of the occupants of the facility a plan for the curtailment of electricity will be developed. When FADRS^® receives notification of a DR event it will not begin initiation of energy curtailment until the date and time requested by the ISO or CSP. At the start of an event FADRS^® instantly and simultaneously sends DR command signals to a facility's electric loads while at the same time retrieving electric KW Demand readings in "Real Time" from the end user's facility back to the CSP, utility and/or ISO so as to measure and verify that the DR is taking place. Because FADRS^® receives feedback from every single electric load it is commanding to curtail and because it is self healing; FADRS^® "knows," in real-time, exactly which loads may not be responding and can therefore take immediate corrective action and/or notify on-site personnel to ensure that the facility is fully compliant.

It should be noted that FADRS^® is not a BAS but rather acts as a "supervisor" to the BAS during a demand response event; at other times it allows the BAS to follow its routine. FADRS^® utilizes self-healing Artificial Intelligence to make an inordinate number of mathematical calculations every second in order to determine which curtailment procedure(s) will have the least negative impact on the end user while at the same time maximizing DR particpation in multiple programs. By making DR participatiion fully automated, FADRS^® removes the risk of human intervention, and insures the DR revenue stream for the facility.

Taking People Into Account: The Special Sauce

One of the largest barriers to enrolling in DR programs is the concern over the comfort of the occupants of a building. This is a valid concern that businesses, hospitals, and even some colleges and universities have not been able to overcome, blocking or limiting their enrollment in DR programs. This was the impetus behind the development of FADRS^® . We developed a system that goes far beyond the typical DR curtailment methodologies such as simply turning off equipment like air-conditioning compressors, instead the Artificial Intelligence upon which FADRS^® is
built, takes over. By accounting for temperature and humidity in different areas of a facility, based on information provided by the BAS to FADRS^®,  adjustments are made to the building systems that will allow for the maximum load reduction with minimum impact to the people within the facility.

If temperatures in a given area begin to reach limits set by the facilities management team, then FADRS^® will immediately identify that area and begin to turn on systems to allow the space to fall back into range. As FADRS^® makes these real-time adjustments, it will reduce an equivalent amount of consumption in another area of the facility in order to maintain the predefined level of load shedding.

Decisions made by FADRS^® are designed to minimize the impact to the facility and its occupants and to allow the facility to maximize their DR revenues. FADRS^® now makes it possible for those facilities that had been reluctant to particpate in DR to now participate in multiple revenue generating programs.

FADRS: Not just HVAC - Lighting Too!

Most energy consultants know that HVAC represents approximately 40% of the electricity used in a commercial building. But for some reason, most people neglect to realize that lighting also represents approximately the same amount of electric usage (30% - 40%). Many energy companies and their clients feel they have accomplished the necessary electric reduction for lighting by performing a lighting retrofit. However, this is far from the case.

Much more electricity can be saved utilizing daylight harvesting in conjunction with occupancy sensors and Demand Response (DR) solutions.

FADRS^® works in conjunction with highly specialized electrical/electronic equipment that saves 15% - 18% on electricity with the T8 fluorescent lighting ON (No reduction in voltage to the light fixture and neglible lumen loss of ±5%), but also allows 33% to 67% of the lighting load to be reduced in order to earn money through demand response. This lighting controller is able to accomplish this because it does not limit the amount of power the ballast draws, but rather it "times" when it may draw power. AC Power is delivered in a single sine wave. A single sine wave happens very fast - 60 times per second. Ballasts need power to operate the flourescent tubes. But there is no power at the "zero crossing" which the sine wave intercepts 120 times per second. By timing where on the sine wave cycle the ballast may draw power, this T8 fluorescent lighting controller allows the ballast to get the power it needs when it is most efficient to do so.

This way, the ballast still provides the power the tubes need to maintain full brightness. The net result is that the ballast provides usable voltage for the fluorescent tubes with less power pulled from the Utility. This leads to longer ballast life and reduced cooling costs since the ballasts operate 13 Degrees F cooler.