According to a recent study of the North American market for environmental control systems in non-residential buildings by i&i limited - Proplan, the growing building control system market still has plenty of room for growth. The study indicates that the North American market is considerably larger than the European market, manufacturers' sales in 2000 at engineered and commissioned prices rose to $2.04 billion, having grown at an unprecedented 16% per annum since 1998.
The study is the second study of the market. The first edition, published in 1998, confirmed that this market was sitting on a powder keg of growth, but despite the remarkable performance over the last two years, the business is far from fully ignited. Projects continue to be underspecified, resulting in a lower penetration of building controls per capita than developed markets in northern Europe.