As the world begins to recover from the pandemic-induced slowdown, commercial buildings are gradually filling up with occupants once again. However, the landscape of facility management has undergone a significant transformation since 2020. Today, facility managers face new challenges and priorities that demand innovative solutions. A digital twin is a connected, virtual replica of a physical product, asset, or system. It can be thought of as a digital thread that stitches together contextual relationships across the as-built environment. For commercial buildings, the digital twin's most important attributes are the building and its spaces, assets, events, and people. Edge IoT sensors continuously record data streams that feed asset systems, which the digital twin replicates and simulates. This data is invaluable in providing a holistic view of the building and its life cycle. As the digital twin collects data over time, its value only grows.

Achieving a successful digital twin relies on two pillars: data and visualization. Through data, a digital twin connects and integrates all building systems into one unified application. It is the foundation upon which digital twins are built. A digital twin is more than just a replica of the building itself; it is also a digital representation of every asset within its spaces. These assets can range from HVAC systems and access control to the connected internet of things (IoT) equipment such as thermostats, cameras, and IAQ sensors.

Revolutionizing Facility Management with Digital Twin Technology

With the advent of digital transformation, facility managers now have the means to control and monitor building events more effectively. However, the vast amount of data generated by connected buildings can be overwhelming. To address this challenge, facility managers are turning to digital twin technology, which provides a holistic view of the building and its life cycle, enabling informed decision-making and improved Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).

A digital twin is essentially a virtual replica of a physical product, asset, or system. In the context of commercial buildings, this technology connects and integrates all building systems into one unified application. By employing data analytics, visualization, and machine learning, facility managers gain valuable insights to optimize building performance.

Implementing a successful digital twin strategy relies on two essential pillars: data and visualization. By harnessing the power of data, facility managers can merge discrete data streams into a cohesive framework that enables improved insights and analysis. Utilizing advanced visualization techniques further enhances decision-making processes, allowing facility managers to quantify building performance against set goals.

Post-pandemic protocols have brought indoor air quality and space utilization to the forefront of facility management priorities. By leveraging digital twin technology, facility managers can monitor and regulate air quality parameters in real-time, ensuring a safe and healthy environment for occupants. Furthermore, by analyzing space utilization data, managers can identify inefficiencies and optimize the usage of available space for maximum occupancy and productivity.

People tracking and contact tracing have become critical elements of building management amid the ongoing pandemic. Digital twin technology enables precise localization and tracking of individuals within commercial buildings, facilitating efficient contact tracing in case of any health-related incidents. This not only enhances safety but also enables better resource allocation and emergency response.

The adoption of a digital twin approach empowers facility managers to drive sustainability and energy efficiency initiatives. By analyzing data collected from various building systems, managers can identify areas of improvement, optimize energy consumption, and reduce the environmental impact of commercial buildings. This enables cost savings and promotes a greener, more sustainable future.

Building an Intelligent Digital Twin

A digital twin refers to a virtual replication of a physical product, asset, or system that is intricately connected. It can be visualized as a digital thread that binds contextual associations across the physical environment. In the context of commercial buildings, the digital twin's key aspects pertain to the building itself, its spaces, assets, events, and people, all of which shape these associations.

To ensure an effective digital twin, two foundational elements are essential. The first entails the utilization of data and visualization techniques to link and harmonize all building systems within a single, unified application. This integration is crucial for the successful implementation of a digital twin.

Data forms the foundation of digital twins. In addition to replicating the physical aspects of a building, a digital twin also encompasses a virtual representation of all assets present within the building's premises. These assets can include various systems such as HVAC, access control, video surveillance, and internet of things (IoT) devices like thermostats, cameras, and IAQ sensors. The IoT sensors located at the edges of the network continuously capture data streams, which are then utilized by the digital twin to replicate and simulate the behavior of the asset systems. By amalgamating these data streams, the digital twin provides a comprehensive overview of the building and its life cycle. Over time, as the digital twin accumulates more data, its value and effectiveness further enhance.

The presentation of a comprehensive perspective offered by a digital twin is achieved through visualization, enabling facility managers and other stakeholders to conveniently observe building health and sustainability metrics all within a unified display. Through the utilization of machine learning and artificial intelligence, subtle alarms are sifted away, leaving only pertinent alarms and notifications. This ensures facility managers are not overwhelmed with an excessive amount of data and can promptly respond to critical events and effectively oversee their work operations with precision and effectiveness.

Embracing Proactive Management Strategies

Transitioning from reactive to proactive management models is made possible by digital twins. These virtual simulations enhance decision-making for facility managers by processing and presenting data with remarkable clarity. Through the utilization of digital twin technology, managers can refer back to the historical states of the built environment and its assets, monitor real-time conditions, make accurate predictions about future circumstances, and even simulate and test upcoming processes and updates.

The capabilities of digital twins are far-reaching and limitless. Instead of seeking to achieve every outcome simultaneously, investing in digital twins can be an incremental process. It involves identifying the most critical digital threads at present, accomplishing one or two use cases to showcase a return on investment, and then gradually incorporating new digital use cases and capabilities. This approach naturally creates an operational network effect.

Over a period of time, the integration of these digital strands forms a comprehensive body of knowledge that is accessed by different individuals involved in the building. Gradually, the individual components utilize the digital twin to make informed and autonomous decisions and possess the ability to rectify issues by independently availing their own services as required. This self-healing capability enables a building to automate acquired knowledge and alleviate facility managers from routine tasks, enabling them to concentrate on emerging and pressing priorities. Through incremental investments in digital twin technology, buildings embark on a journey towards autonomy and self-repair.

Introducing the Inception of Digital Stitches

When a facility manager is in the initial stages, they should concentrate on the most significant priorities and gradually expand the digital twin's capabilities to cater to present requirements. These priorities are contingent upon the needs of both the building and its occupants.
Current considerations following the post-quarantine period involve ensuring optimal air quality, maintaining peak performance of HVAC and ventilation systems, and maximizing space utilization. By employing occupant people-counting sensors, digital twins have the capability to accurately anticipate real-time air cooling, heating, and clean air circulation based on occupancy and space utilization.

Physical-logical security relies on employee badge access to ascertain the individuals present within the premises. To bolster cybersecurity measures, the IT system should restrict employees from logging in simultaneously from multiple locations. Meanwhile, employing people-counting sensors and retaining the digital data allows for precise identification of utilized and under-utilized areas. This information can then be utilized to optimize the usage of meeting rooms, workplaces, common areas, labs, storage facilities, and car parks, by making necessary modifications for increased efficiency.

Using digital twin technology, facility managers can efficiently manage spaces by adjusting heating and cooling based on occupancy. This ensures that spaces without people do not need to be heated or cooled in the same manner. By identifying occupancy trends, facility managers can activate equipment only when necessary, therefore optimizing comfort and tracking the flow of clean air. To enhance data accuracy, mobile comfort apps are increasingly utilized, providing a more comprehensive insight than solely relying on thermostat sensors. This approach is particularly beneficial as energy consumption accounts for a significant portion of operational expenses. Ultimately, optimizing energy consumption through these measures not only improves sustainability but also helps minimize costs.

Crafting the Digital Tapestry

The digital twin ecosystem encompasses various solutions that enhance the capabilities of the twin. These solutions consist of edge IoT, cloud to cloud integrations, and a partner ecosystem.
The edge IoT primarily involves sensorization, which provides valuable metadata for intelligence. This technology enables connection and data reception from multiple sensors that simultaneously monitor asset performance within a building. By collecting and amalgamating sensor data, the edge IoT feeds sensor events into the digital twin graph through a cloud component. This facilitates the understanding of each asset's identity, location, generated events, and current state.

To consolidate these solutions, a partner ecosystem plays a vital role. Companies like Johnson Controls collaborate closely with technology partners, system integrators, and 3D BIM visualization companies such as Autodesk. This collaboration brings context to the data flowing throughout the system, ensuring a comprehensive and efficient operation.

It allows facility managers to monitor a building's energy consumption, air quality, and occupant key performance indicators (KPIs) within a single interface. By utilizing a 3D Building Information Model (BIM), heat maps, and data-driven analytics, the digital twin visualization enriches, offering a comprehensive understanding of alarms and notifications across various building spaces, assets, and events. This enhanced context facilitates informed decision-making.

The integration of such solutions enables the real-time and historical data to be captured and accessed, aiding facility managers in optimizing operations. Leveraging the digital twin ecosystem, facility managers can simulate and model future scenarios for numerous years, aligning their actions with specific goals. Gradually, the interconnected digital threads weave a fabric of intelligence, providing valuable insights.

Transitioning from Reactive to Pro-active Self-healing

Facility managers can leverage this intelligent fabric to develop more intelligent buildings that effectively address immediate emergencies while establishing a data framework for autonomous, self-repairing buildings in the future. With continuous enhancement, the digital twin transforms into a decision engine, providing facility managers with comprehensive insights devoid of unnecessary alarm noise. This enables more precise predictions, recommendations, and swift actions, fortifying and expediting the decision-making process. It also aids in failure prevention, efficiency improvement, and cost reduction.

Systems can initiate communication on their own and function independently, relieving the need for human involvement. These systems possess the capability to automatically make decisions and generate work orders whenever necessary. Consequently, facility managers can transition from handling intricate details to overseeing them. By assuming a role of reviewing and approving automated processes, they can redirect their expertise towards other areas of utmost importance. With the aid of a digital twin, facility managers can gain insights into the historical, current, and future state of a building environment. This empowers managers to pose hypothetical scenarios through "what-if" questions, thereby enhancing their decision-making abilities. Such tools assist facility managers in proactively preparing for an ever-evolving future—one that is more intelligent, self-repairing, and sustainable.

The holistic view provided by a digital twin is presented through visualization. This allows facility managers and other stakeholders to see building health and sustainability metrics in a single pane of glass. In other words, all the essential information is readily available and easily understood. By employing machine learning and artificial intelligence, nuance alarms are filtered out, leaving only prominent alarms and notifications for facility managers. This ensures that they don't get overwhelmed with an excessive amount of data. Instead, they can focus on high-priority events and manage their workstreams with efficiency and accuracy.