Priva Blue ID provides impressive energy saving solution in hotel

Located within the historic walls of Derry, Northern Ireland’s second largest city, the Maldron Hotel is a 90-room facility with restaurant, bar and grill, 300-delegate conference theatre, banqueting suite, mini gym and sauna. Like a growing number in its industry, the hotel wanted to update its existing boiler house and AHU control panels to the latest technology, a move that would help drive considerable energy efficiencies. The hotel’s owners engaged the help of building services consultants Beers Engineering and M&E contractor Pipeline Services Belfast to provide the strategy and solution to meet the project objectives.

First choice retrofit solution

Serving the bar and function rooms, as well as the restaurant and kitchen areas, the existing control panels were manually operated and outdated. To turn the hotel’s vision into reality, ACS Controls, a specialist in the configuration and installation of energy management systems were engaged to deliver the controls strategy. The building automation system of choice at ACS is Priva’s Blue ID, an innovative, modular solution that is quick and easy to install and program.

ACS Controls has a proven track record in identifying competitive solutions to energy management by looking at a building through the eyes of the occupier and tailoring the desired level of controls around the end user’s requirements. The company deemed Maldron Hotel Derry was ideal for Blue ID, which has been developed in accordance with the ‘best fit’ principle. Thanks to its modularity, Priva Blue ID is suitable for every application, from a small hotel to a large hospital, and from a university complex to a data centre.

Priva Blue ID hardware consists of a base on which individual functional modules, containing all mission-critical components, can be installed. The wiring takes place on the base, which is robust and insensitive to failures.

Easy access

ACS designed the front end controls system with ‘non-engineers’ in mind, making them simple to use by all front-of-house staff. In fact, Blue ID requires no more than a computer with an internet connection and a standard browser. The browser provides access to a web server in each controller. Although each controller has its own IP address, access to one controller provides access to all others — unlike other systems which require each controller to be accessed individually.

The software provides a complete overview of the system’s status, allowing users to analyse the behaviour of the building. For example, the effects of a particular setting of indoor temperature can be examined —as can the relation between indoor and outdoor temperature.

“The system was designed in such a way that all front office staff have access to the controls and can easily operate the heating, ventilation and hot water,” states Mike Gatt, General Manager at Maldron Hotel Derry. “This allows us to maintain operating levels where required and, importantly, provides the option to switch off energy to areas within the hotel when they are not needed. Historically, these areas would have been served by systems running excess to requirement. Since installation, we have seen significant reductions in energy bills.”

Impressive savings for hotel

Following installation, the first three months showed that electricity consumption at Maldron Hotel Derry had reduced by 76,007 kWh compared with the same period in the previous year. In financial terms, this equates to a saving of £10,489.

“The new equipment establishes best practice at the hotel in terms of relating energy consumption to occupancy and reliability of supply,” says Mr Gatt. “The fact that this was achieved with the project fully funded by the Carbon Trust Interest Free Loan Scheme is a testament to the technology’s potential in terms of cost and environmental savings.”

Mr Gatt confirms that the hotel is on track to achieve a project payback of less than four years, with an environmental saving of 320 TCO2e per annum.

“This is tremendous performance given the level of capital investment involved and establishes a terrific platform upon which the business can trade for the next 15 years,” he concludes.