CASE STUDY
Keeping watch over one of the world’s most innovative green campuses
WIN-911’s remote alarm monitoring helps protect UBC’s new $88M campus heating system
Transformative Energy Project Saves Costs & Carbon Pollution
With 67,000 students and 18,000 faculty and staff, UBC is British Columbia’s oldest and largest university. It’s flagship Vancouver campus is spread over 100 acres and comprises more than 160 buildings — including classrooms, research labs, animal care facilities, 12,000 housing beds, an Olympic size swimming pool, 330-bed hospital, and the world’s largest cyclotron.
Connecting all those buildings is a new $88M, 45MWt hot water heating system. The previous system, a 90-year old steam plant and pipe network, was costly to maintain and frequently broke down. With sustainability at the forefront, the university embarked on a five-year upgrade project to replace 14 kilometres of steam piping and the old steam plant with a new Campus Energy Center, as well as a Bioenergy Research Demonstration Facility, which uses wood chips and renewable natural gas to power turbines. The result is a 22% decrease in carbon dioxide emissions and 24% gain in energy efficiency.
UBC’s Campus Energy Centre houses three massive high efficiency natural gas boilers.
(All photos below courtesy of UBC)
WIN-911 enables our operators to respond faster and more effectively to the ongoing changes and demands of our energy operations.”
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—Huy Pham,
Industrial Controls Technical Specialist, UBC Energy & Water Services
UBC’s Bioenergy Research Demonstration Facility processes renewable biomass to generate thermal energy for heating.
FactoryTalk and WIN-911 pair up to keep an eye on the plant
To operate and monitor this new heating system, maintenance staff use a Rockwell FactoryTalk SCADA system. WIN-911 software directly connects to the FactoryTalk system, sending remote alarm and event notifications to operators’ mobile phones.
An operator watches over the UBC Campus Energy Center operations using the FactoryTalk HMI.
UBC uses three standalone WIN-911 systems: the first monitors the power source in the Campus Energy Center and the second monitors the hot backup. A third system monitors the various operations of the BRDF power plant. The most important task for WIN-911 is to make sure the three gas-fired water boilers in the CEC are maintained at an optimal level.
Remote monitoring enhanced through new smartphone app
Pham says his department recently upgraded to WIN-911’s new Advanced software platform to take advantage of its mobile capabilities.
“We have used V7 Pro with Mobile 911 for years, but chose WIN-911 Advanced to use the new WIN-911 Mobile app,” says Pham. “Any alarm that comes through is a critical alarm. We’re continually measuring temperature and pressure in the system. So when an alarm comes through, the operator can quickly view, acknowledge, and respond to an alarm no matter where they are on campus.”
An operator inspects the engine room at the UBC Campus Energy Center.
According to Pham, WIN-911 Mobile enables one of six operators to respond faster to ongoing changes and demands, without being tied to the control room. “Our people are free to move onto the floor and visually check the engines and perform maintenance tasks.”
“The control room is three floors up from the boilers, so they don’t have to run upstairs to simply acknowledge an alarm.”
The new WIN-911 Mobile app allows operators to drill down into reports from their smartphone, chat with team members to see what options are available, and decide how to respond.
From a cost management perspective, WIN-911 allows the team to maintain the equipment with 1-2 crew members per shift by making their work much more efficient.
We have used V7 Pro with Mobile 911 for years, but chose WIN-911 Advanced to use the new WIN-911 Mobile app”
“
—Huy Pham,
Industrial Controls Technical Specialist, UBC Energy & Water Services
Alarms received within two-minutes of reaching SCADA