Why do we act like AI is a new phenomenon? AI has been present in our industry for nearly a decade—from “fuzzy logic” in the 80s with the Honeywell “iPID” (intelligent PID) for Central Plants to modern deployments by Carrier (Cortix) and Siemens (BuildingX). I even saw Mike Donlon of CompuTrols presenting LIVE at BOMA in 2016. AI and machine learning. Embedded in the control system. Every point had a “digital twin” (model).
It is time to move past the debate and focus on execution.
Much of the industry is currently obsessed with (human) AI governance. Yet, in the real world, the technology is already here and operating autonomously. Also, TRUST is the latest “buzzword,” yet we’ve been TRUSTING the existing “Nintendo 64” type BAS systems for our mission-critical Central Plant equipment since the mid-80s. No one ever talked about this.
I think another issue is that most of the industry is CONFUSED about the different types of AI! Pundits always mention “hallucinations.” Yeah, that’s only applicable to LLM “chat” bots. Does Tesla use Grok to drive their cars autonomously? Of course they don’t. Who does that? Apparently, AI “experts” in the built environment.
At Facil.AI, our customers are not asking for endless governance debates or complex semantic standards. They care about:
- Efficiency: Stopping the historical 30% waste of electricity.
- Safety & Reliability: Ensuring systems operate at peak performance without human error.
- Value: Getting results today, not in two years.
We have moved beyond the “experimentation” phase. The enterprise AI gold rush is over; what comes next is execution. We are no longer waiting for permissions or debating the philosophy of automation. We are implementing it. It is time the industry stops acting like this technology is a mystery and starts treating it like what it is: the new standard for operational excellence.
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