Recommendations for Deployments

Ensuring the safe operation of devices working with VOLTTRON is essential. This page will discuss recommendations/experiences for doing deployments to meet these needs.

In a previous deployment, VOLTTRON worked with a facilities manager to create virtual points which the platform would control:

• VolttronEnabled
• VolttronHeartbeat
• VoltronOverride
• VolttronCoolingSetPoint

When VOLTTRON is active it sets the VolttronEnabled flag. It also twiddles the VolttronHeartbeat point every minute. While the Enabled flag is set and the Heartbeat is active, the controller will use VOLTTRON specific points instead of base points (VolttronCoolingSetPoint instead of CoolingSetPoint).

If VolttronOveride is set then the controller ignores the VOLTTRON points and reverts to normal operation. Likewise, if the Heartbeat point is not being actively set by the platform or if VolttronEnabled is false, then the controller reverts to normal control.

If VolttronEnabled and (active Heartbeat) and not (VolttronOverride) then use Volttron virtual points