SAMBA – Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ) Monitoring Platform

SAMBA (Sentient Ambient Monitoring of Buildings in Australia) is a world first, low cost solution that accurately monitors IEQ indicators including; air and radiant temperature, humidity, air speed, light levels, sound pressure level, carbon dioxide concentration and total volatile organic compounds. These parameters when monitored and measured give a summative assessment of thermal comfort, indoor air quality, luminous environmental quality and acoustic environmental quality for building occupants. High resolution measurements of these IEQ parameters from the occupants work desks in real time means SAMBA can measure, monitor and report dynamically allowing environmental management to respond efficiently.

There are two fundamental ways to evaluate IEQ parameters; a low cost method which is a simple snap shot of parameters offering insufficient spatial and temporal sampling to give accurate information or an in depth method requires expensive scientific instrumentation and specialist expertise. Both methods are conducted at a single point in time, which means that the data are unrepresentative of the overall conditions prevailing inside the building on different days or in different times of the year. In order to be more representative of the indoor environmental conditions actually experienced by building occupants, SAMBA has been designed to be very small, meaning it can deploy seamlessly into the occupied zone on operator's desks without impacting their work space. This combined with constant real time monitoring means big data at higher resolution. This leads to unparalleled information and building management.

Building performance rating schemes (NABERS, GreenStar, WELL) are based on protocols covering the measurement and analysis of building energy, water and IEQ within buildings. SAMBA collects big data across IEQ parameters and has powerful analytics tools accessible via a dashboard making all the data accessible and actionable. Actions can lower energy consumption and improve occupant comfort and productivity. This unique ability gives SAMBA further value to building management by providing technical evidence for understanding healthy, comfortable and productive workplaces.

The data stream generated by SAMBA and the powerful tools embedded in the IEQ dashboard can be used in a range of applications aimed at building environment improvement. SAMBA also provides empirical evidence to asses and improve the performance of building or systems enhancements. SAMBA is a scalable system, each station feeds the data stream, each station is portable and can be deployed across any working environment to test and monitor all working areas. From one to one hundred, the stations mesh together giving unprecedented access to data. Each SAMBA module is uniquely addressable which means data and location within the building can be used to manage the indoor environment in real time.

The latest IPCC report has delivered a very clear indicator of the major contribution that energy consumption from the built environment has made to the driving forces of climate change. Addressing both the carbon footprint attached to the provision of energy to the built environment AND occupant health and well being requires a better understanding of how buildings work. SAMBA 's low costs, long term, real time data sampling solution will not only help make IEQ accessible but also provide deep understanding of building IEQ performance. This equips building managers with the information they need to optimize building performance reducing carbon footprint, energy consumption and improving occupant well being.