In a world where no one knows what the future holds, we’re making decisions and investing in our buildings so they can adapt for different futures. 100 Liverpool Street is a leading example of blending digital and physical placemaking to create outstanding places.
Digital placemaking
‘Smart’ is fast becoming a throwaway word many companies use to describe any new piece of equipment or app. For us, smart is bigger than this, much bigger. It’s about more than isolated pieces of technology, it’s about integrating hardware and software to improve the user experience.
Due for completion this year, 100 Liverpool Street is the first major office building in the UK with a converged network and integrated sub-systems for Internet of Things ready infrastructure. This will deliver a wealth of data into a single dashboard, facilitating deep, real-time insights of what’s happening in the building, so we can optimise operational performance – enhancing the customer experience, supporting wellbeing, minimising environmental impacts and saving money.
We’ve put a lot of focus on creating a place that can continue to be upgraded for whatever the future might bring. Every system within 100 Liverpool Street is specified so it can send and receive data in a common language protocol – from lightbulbs, energy meters and air quality sensors, to chillers, boilers and lifts. This consistent approach to naming and data, which my colleague Jules Barker blogged on here, allows data and commands to be sent and received from both traditional system head ends and cloud based software, via secure gateways.
Our whole digital philosophy is based on the foundations of data security and privacy. So, we’re incorporating best-in-class security processes. And 100 Liverpool Street’s converged network means we have complete control over what is and isn’t connected to the internet.
With more businesses looking for smart and sustainable buildings, customers are enthusiastic about opportunities at 100 Liverpool Street and we’re actively talking about how they can do their fit outs to make the most of the smart space they’re buying into.
Grappling with climate challenges
As the real estate industry grapples with climate challenges and we map out how we’re going to achieve ambitious net zero targets, smart has a big role to play. It has the power to transform how buildings are occupied and operated – optimising performance and experience.
100 Liverpool Street’s digital design and infrastructure mean we can look at energy and carbon data alongside things like air quality, temperatures, daylight and weather. And everything’s visualised in a user-friendly way, so it’s easily understandable and quickly actionable. When sensors show some spaces aren’t being used, those areas can be shut down, cutting energy costs and carbon. We’ll also know how many hours every lightbulb, boiler, chiller, pump and fan have been on, so we can anticipate when they need servicing or replacing, fixing problems before they even happen, so the customer experience is always positive.
Smart is the evolution of the energy management systems we first rolled out across our portfolio ten years ago, leading our industry. When you think of the huge savings achieved by having more granular energy data – we’ve improved energy efficiency by 44% across our portfolio over the last decade – I’m excited about the opportunities as we move into the operational phase. We’ll be able to use these new datasets and test how they can enhance performance, as we create great places, inside and out.
Humans are the best sensors you can get
Humans are the best sensors you can get, so we’re always acting on customer feedback. But there are a lot of wellbeing variables that are invisible to people, so we’re supplementing human input with digital sensors that will give us further insight into the physical environment and empower us to make improvements before customers make a call or tap our app.
Sensors measuring CO2 and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) – which have been shown to impact on cognitive performance – give us live data to act on so we hit our performance thresholds. Importantly, our digital infrastructure allows us to add new sensors and adjust existing ones as technology and research advance. Our end goal is for everything to happen in real-time, with machine learning sitting on top.
We’re also putting everything in place at design stage to achieve our target of Gold WELL Certification during operation. This supports our approach to actively monitoring and managing wellbeing performance over the lifetime of the building. You can read my blog on WELL here.
Social relationships are powerful drivers of human health and wellbeing too. By the time 100 Liverpool Street opens, there’ll be a single app for people to engage in the local community – so they can join nearby clubs and forums, or even start one up, and find out about events and activities to enjoy. Community today involves both digital and physical worlds.
Delivering smart collaboratively
My hope for the future is that the property industry comes together to deliver smart collaboratively, exploring the big challenges that we all share as companies and as a society – in that way we’ll transform climate performance and customer experience.
In many ways, as an industry, we need to reflect the characteristics of smart building – so we’re all connected and constantly learning and improving. Consistent data naming would be a good start!