USE OF A GEO-FENCING PERIMETER FOR ENERGY EFFICIENT BUILDING CONTROL
A method and system of associating the personal remote mobile communications devices of occupants with the room and spaces they occupy in a building or other facility and generating commands to a building automation system based on changes in the location of the mobile communications devices relative to the associated room or space.
1 . A method of adjusting control devices of a building automation system (BAS), the method including the steps of:
generating a geo-fencing perimeter that defines a space in a building;
associating the space with an occupant authorized to occupy the space;
downloading a cloud-based application to a mobile communications device (MCD) under the control of the occupant; and
using location-based services (LBS) provided by the MCD to determine entering or leaving the geo-fencing perimeter.
2 . The method of claim 1 , further including the steps of
transmitting a command from the MCD to BAS configured to control the space when the LBS of the MCD detects the MCD entering or leaving of a geo-fencing perimeter.
3 . The method of claim 2 , further including the step of adjusting building control systems of the building responsive to the command received from the MCD.
4 . The method of claim 3 , where the BAS includes security systems, fire safety systems, lighting systems, and heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems.
5 . The method of claim 1 , where the step of generating a geo-fencing perimeter further includes determining geographical coordinates of the space.
6 . The method of claim 1 , where the space in a building is a virtual space defined by geographical coordinates irrespective of physical dimensions.
7 . The method of claim 1 , where the step of comparing further includes:
determining a distance between the determined location of the MCD and the geo-fencing perimeter;
comparing the distance to a predetermined threshold limit; and
indicating a change of location if the threshold limit is exceeded.
8 . An apparatus for adjusting control devices of a building automation system (BAS), comprising:
geo-fencing perimeters that define spaces in a building;
occupier identifiers that associate occupants with the geo-fencing perimeters;
a plurality of mobile communications devices under the control of the occupants;
a memory that stores the geo-fencing perimeters and the occupier identifiers;
an application in signal communication with the memory that executes a plurality of instructions that determines locations of each of the plurality of mobile communications devices and compares the locations against the corresponding geo-fencing perimeters.
9 . The apparatus of claim 8 , where the comparison of the locations of the mobile communications devices against the corresponding geo-fencing perimeters indicates whether the spaces are occupied or unoccupied.
10 . The apparatus of claim 9 , where the mobile communications devices include remote personal Global Positioning System (GPS)-enabled and Bluetooth-enabled mobile communications devices communicating over a wireless network with the BAS.