Lake County Central Permit Facility

Libertyville, Illinois, United States

Government / Public

The building is the Central Permit Facility and Water Quality Laboratory for Lake County in Waukegan, IL. The Building Automation System design goal was to integrate virtually all building systems into one common BACnet Internetwork. All HVAC, Lighting, Fire Alarm, Electrical and specialty systems such as the lab controls, server room air conditioning, elevator, foam system have BACnet interfaces.

Automated Logic was responsible for integrating in these devices to the BACnet Internetwork. Johnson Controls was responsible for integrating in the Phoenix Lab controls and all chiller plant components.

Appin Associates specified the BACnet device requirements so that each vendor providing a device (e.g. fire alarm) was responsible for providing the equipment as a BACnet device regardless of what protocol the device used. This \”Networked Controls\” approach simplified the integration work as ALC was responsible for making a BACnet MS/TP or a BACnet/IP connection to the device. Equipment suppliers who did not have native BACnet equipment made arrangements for a BACnet interface to be installed with their device. This process simplified the startup and commissioning of the project as a whole.

Number of Buildings1

Total Area64,500

Special Features

The building incorporated in a number of sustainable design features including a green roof and a stormwater retention system. Lake County wanted all building systems to be networkable so as to simplify building operation and maintenance procedures. Qualified vendors who are responsible for maintenance of the various systems will be given secure remote access to their systems to permit remote diagnosis and troubleshooting of these systems. Equipment vendors co-operated by exposing all possible data points as BACnet objects to permit remote diagnosis and troubleshooting. This project demonstrates the scalability of BACnet where all systems in a building (except security in this case) can either be native BACnet or can easily come with a BACnet interface to present the equipment as if it were a BACnet device. The "Networked Controls" design model shows how a job can be designed and bid without the need for a third party system integrator. Equipment suppliers were free to bid on one or more components (HVAC, lighting, fire) as each piece of equipment was required to come with a BACnet interface.

Products/Equipment Installed

- Automated Logic LGR, M-line, Z-line.
- Johnson Control NAE and York Chiller interface.
- ITT BACnet Interface in a Danfoss VSD.
- ABB VSD.
- Phoenix BACnet Server.
- Liebert SiteLink by OEMCtrl.
- FieldServer BACnet interfaces to Fike Cheetah Foam Panel
- Eaton Switchgear and Electrical Meter
- Caterpiller Generator/Transfer Switch
- Lift-Net BACnet interface to a ThyssenKrupp elevator
- Dri-Steem BACnet interface to a humidifier
- ITT BACnet inteface to a Domestic Water Booster Pump System
- Bell & Gossett BACnet interface to a Danfoss VSD/Pump Controller
- Lutron Lighting System BACnet interface
- GE EST Fire Alarm BACnet interface
- Megatron BACnet interface to a cooling tower water treatment system
- Automated Logic BACnet interfaces to various LonMark and Modbus devices.

Systems IntegratedBoiler, Chiller, HVAC, CO2 Monitoring, VAV, Laboratory, Fume Hood, Power Monitoring, Water Monitoring

Number of Devices100

System Points10,000

Owner / OccupierLake County

Engineering FirmAppin Associates

Controls ContractorALC Chicago and Johnson Controls

Controls ContractorABB, Automated Logic Corporation, Danfoss Drives A/S, Johnson Controls, OEMCtrl, Phoenix Controls

OtherFieldServer, ITT