United Kingdom: To make it easy for people to find their way around and take control of air conditioning systems, Toshiba has announced launching a new mini-BMS system for improved indoor comfort and building efficiency.

The system, the announcement said, enables remote access by users to control and monitor functions via a standard PC internet browser, a tablet or smartphone, including diagnosing of potential problems. The announcement added that the system gives access to control parameters for indoor units and outside plant, plus full temperature reporting and logging, and power monitoring for the whole building.

In the event of a problem in the air conditioning system, the mini-BMS, the company revealed, can automatically send an email or text alerts to notify a building manager that an issue needs attention. The system, the company further said, logs and stores energy usage data to provide a valuable record which can be analysed in detail. It can do this for the whole building or specified parts of a building, giving the user the ability to automatically graph and evaluate performance over time, as part of an ongoing energy management programme, added the company.

Originally developed by Toshiba for use in the retail sector, the mini-BMS, the company highlighted, is ideally suited for applications requiring a flexible and adaptable control platform, which caters for a wide range of end-user requirements. Target sectors, it added, include commercial offices, hospitals, leisure centres, restaurants and premium residential apartments.

“… Toshiba’s mini-BMS has been designed from the ground up to be easy to operate by non-specialists without knowledge of air conditioning systems, providing significant advantages in terms of speed of setup, flexibility and ease of use,” said David Dunn, Director and General Manager of Toshiba Air Conditioning. “It enables air conditioning engineers to quickly set up and configure a new system across a whole building, and enables an existing system to be easily changed in the light of changes to building use. For the end user, it provides an accessible and easy-to-use interface for controlling and monitoring their air conditioning system on a daily and ongoing basis.”