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Using the latest and appropriate technology will significantly help optimise the resources of institutions and reduce the cost of maintaining existing facilities, a senior official of Qatar University (QU) has said. |
As an example, business operations department COO Abdulla Yaqoub al-Sayed noted that QU has installed a Building Management System (BMS) to remotely monitor buildings – chillers, air handling units, fire pumps, plumbing pumps, and electrical supply.
He was one of the speakers at the 3rd Facility Management Conference held yesterday which was attended by Sheikh Faleh bin Nasser al-Thani, undersecretary of general services at the Ministry of Municipality and Urban Planning.
Al-Sayed said using BMS increases their level of comfort and at the same time saves a lot of money.
“Otherwise, we will be needing thousands of people to go around which is not feasible,” stressed al-Sayed, adding that they have to balance and maximise the use of technology.
Citing another example, he said QU uses about 10,000 lights which do not require ordinary check ups like ordinary lights.
He pointed out that using LED lights saves energy and maintenance cost since they have longer life.
Since QU is banking on more expansions, he said they will also install thousands of CCTV cameras in various areas of the campus.
“You cannot depend on humans to go around the campus,” he added. “We will be having them for check up but we need those systems to make sure these areas are safe.”
However, the engineer also reiterated the importance of doing a study before using any technology especially if it is too expensive.
He said besides their annual expenses of about QR500mn, they are expecting to spend around QR3bn for various projects in the next couple of years. QU has a separate budget for facility management.
Part of its ongoing project include a new pharmacy college building, a male and female classroom building, a faculty office building and an early childhood centre.
The university will also have a multi-storey parking that can accommodate 2,500 cars.
“All of the other new buildings will have underground car parks and this will hopefully solve our parking problem permanently,” he said.
How much money will be saved, al-Sayed said will depend on what technology is used.
A number of topics were also discussed during the conference which included: ‘What technology can do – costs down, efficiency up!’, ‘Financial Management and Museums: Cultural institutions need exhibits – they also need Financial Management!’