About PLEX The Estimator Home Automation Contact
NEC 2026 formally adopts limited energy as the standard terminology for the class of systems previously referred to as low voltage — including communications, data, security, audio/visual, and control wiring. Limited Energy eXperts was built around this language from the start.
Independent Consulting · AI-Enabled Engineering · Smart Automation

Shawn C. Tovey / RCDD

LIMITED ENERGY EXPERTS

AI does not replace the design engineer, just as the tractor did not replace the farmer. It is a tool. A well-qualified and experienced engineer of record is required to drive the AI tractor.

— Shawn C. Tovey, RCDD

Shawn C. Tovey, RCDD

Limited Energy eXperts (LEX) is an independent consulting practice focused on practical AI adoption for engineering, low-voltage design, and home automation workflows. LEX helps turn repetitive technical work into structured, repeatable processes — from Division 27 and Division 28 engineering support to AI-assisted estimating, documentation, coordination, and system planning.


The focus is not AI for its own sake. It is using AI where it actually helps: reducing manual effort, improving consistency, accelerating design decisions, and giving engineers, contractors, and homeowners better tools to solve real problems.

Project Experience

Sectors Served

Physical security and ICT design experience across a broad range of facility types — from hyperscale mission-critical infrastructure to public-serving facilities, federal installations, and healthcare environments.

Hyperscale Data Centers Federal Facilities Defense Facilities Law Enforcement Corrections Education Healthcare Finance Enterprise Campuses Critical Infrastructure Commercial Facilities Public Safety / EMS Manufacturing Residential / Smart Home

Hyperscale Data Center Security Program. Contributed to more than $170M in physical security solution proposals for hyperscale data center and mission-critical clients. Scope included full physical security architecture — access control, VMS, PIDS, and perimeter defense design — validated against operational requirements and constructability constraints. Developed automated estimating and proposal tools that standardized solution development and enabled scalable engineering support across design teams. Experienced in design-assist delivery, owner-stakeholder coordination, and translating complex security requirements into defensible, code-compliant construction documents.

Qualified. Verified.

Credentials

The list below reflects manufacturer training and platform exposure carried through years of design and field work — not a dated certification roster. The work shows what the training built.

RCDD
Registered Communications Distribution Designer
BICSI
BICSI's senior credential for ICT distribution design — structured cabling systems, pathways and spaces, and engineering documentation.
MCDE
Milestone Certified Design Engineer
Milestone Systems
Design of complex video surveillance systems on Milestone XProtect — server sizing, storage calculation, and recording infrastructure.
Hanwha
Wisenet Platform
Hanwha Vision
AI-capable IP cameras, Wisenet WAVE VMS configuration, and network video recorder management.
Exacqvision
VMS System Engineering
Exacq Technologies
System engineering on Exacqvision VMS — installation, configuration, and performance tuning.
Salient
CompleteView VMS
Salient Systems
Enterprise video surveillance architecture, server configuration, and platform administration.
Axis CP
Axis Certified Professional
Axis Communications
Network video system design — Axis camera platform, edge processing, and IP networking fundamentals.
Genetec
Omnicast & Synergis Platform
Genetec Inc.
Security Center deployment and configuration — Omnicast video management and Synergis access control.
2N
IP Intercom & Access Platform
2N Telekomunikace
Deployment, configuration, and integration of 2N IP intercoms, access control, and My2N cloud management.
Optex
Redscan LiDAR Detection
Optex Inc.
Laser-based outdoor perimeter intrusion detection — zone configuration and false-alarm reduction.
FCMP
Firetide Certified Mesh Professional
Firetide
Multi-service, high-bandwidth wireless mesh network design, configuration, and field troubleshooting.
FAA
UAS Remote Pilot — Part 107
Federal Aviation Administration
Commercial drone operator license — federal airspace regulations, operating limits, and UAS safety protocols.
FCC
Amateur Radio Operator — W9SCT
Federal Communications Commission
RF operations, communications electronics, regulatory compliance, and emergency radio infrastructure.
OSHA
OSHA 30 — Construction Safety
U.S. Department of Labor
30-hour construction safety training — hazard recognition, federal safety standards, and worksite risk management.
Operator
Aerial Lift, Lift Truck, and Loader
OSHA-Aligned Operator Certification
Equipment training — safety and load handling for boom lifts, aerial work platforms, forklifts, and loaders.
What I'm Building

Tools

The free tools on this site — PLEX and The Estimator — came from real project needs. PLEX was built to simplify telecom room power, UPS, generator, and cooling coordination. The Estimator was built because low-voltage bidding still depends too heavily on spreadsheets that were never designed for Division 27/28 scope. The remaining tools run on a private local stack.

Each agent performs 90–95% of the lift — intake, parsing, comparison, draft output. The engineer of record reviews, owns, and stands behind the result. The judgment calls stay with the human.
PLEX
Power Load EXaminer  ·  TR / ER Infrastructure Sizing

Purpose-built utility for sizing telecom room and equipment room infrastructure. Input active equipment loads and PLEX calculates power distribution requirements, UPS sizing, generator sizing, PoE budget, and cooling demand — aligned to BICSI and TIA standards.

Launch PLEX →
Live
The Estimator
BICSI WBS  ·  Limited Energy Job Costing  ·  Customer Proposal & Internal Bid Report

Client-side job estimator purpose-built for limited energy contractors. Builds from BICSI WBS section codes, calculates labor using configurable crew roles, workweek patterns, and federal or California OT rules. Generates sell-side pricing using margin form, produces a customer-ready proposal, and an internal bid report with financial roll-up, bid health indicators, and auto-generated risk flags. No account required. No data leaves the browser.

Launch The Estimator →
Live
Spec Generator
CSI MasterFormat  ·  Div 27 and Div 28  ·  Construction-Ready Output

Generates complete, construction-ready specification sections driven by structured project intake. Prohibited items flagged automatically. Mandatory standards enforced by default. Outputs one section at a time for practitioner review before proceeding. Built around a knowledge base of pre-approved base specification templates — adaptable to a firm's own standard templates so output matches in-house format.

Private Stack
Spec Reviewer
BOM Extraction  ·  Responsibility Matrix  ·  Integrator Intake

Reviews specifications from the integrator's seat. Extracts the Bill of Materials automatically to accelerate quoting, and builds a responsibility matrix mapping scope items to trades. Designed to turn a slow manual takeoff into a fast first pass the estimator can refine.

Private Stack
Submittal Reviewer
Submittal vs. Specification Comparison  ·  EOR Workflow

Compares incoming submittal packages against the contract specification. Flags deviations, missing items, and proposed substitutions for engineer-of-record review. Drafts the markup so the EOR focuses on the judgment calls, not the line-by-line cross-check.

Private Stack
RFI Assistant
RFI Review  ·  Specification Cross-Check  ·  Response Structure

Reviews incoming RFIs against the specification, identifies the governing clauses, and prepares a structured draft response for the engineer of record. EOR provides the technical answer; the assistant handles the lookup, structure, and formatting.

Private Stack
Field QA Assistant
Jobsite Walk  ·  Photo Capture  ·  QA Site Survey Report

Walk the jobsite capturing photos of key items. At the end of the walk, the assistant identifies equipment and installation details, compares observations against the specification and applicable standards, and assists with generation of the QA site survey report.

Private Stack
Home Automation Platform
Local Inference & Home Automation Stack  ·  Private Lab

Dedicated home server running the private inference stack and home automation platform. All LEX private stack tools run here — no cloud inference, no third-party data exposure. Tailscale VPN keeps the stack accessible and off the public internet.

Home automation integrates a full sensor and device network via Home Assistant (Lovelace UI), with Node.js services connecting to TP-Link Kasa lighting, YoLink leak and environmental sensors, SmartThings appliances, Resideo thermostat, Tesla Powerwall energy monitoring, and Aladdin Connect garage access. Dashboards are built in Grafana against InfluxDB time-series data, with JSON and HTML customization throughout.

See Home Automation Design →
Docker Ollama Open-WebUI Home Assistant Lovelace Node.js Grafana InfluxDB Tesla Powerwall YoLink Tailscale JSON / HTML
Home Lab
Perspective

AI in Div 27 / 28 Design

How this tooling gets built and why it is being built this way.

The limited energy design space has a documentation problem. Specifications get recycled from project to project, BOMs drift from drawings, and the practitioners with the most domain knowledge spend a disproportionate amount of time on formatting, cross-referencing, and administrative output that adds no design value.

A model that understands TIA-568, knows the difference between a TR and an ER, and can generate Section 270000 language from a design intent conversation is a force multiplier. It still requires the credentialed practitioner who has to review it, own it, and stand behind it. The RCDD drives. The AI handles the repetitive field work.

Everything runs locally on dedicated on-premise hardware — a private inference and home automation server I own and operate. No cloud inference. No third-party data exposure. Sensitive project information stays where it belongs. The stack is built on open-weight models grounded in real standards language, not generalist models that hallucinate BICSI references and invent TIA clause numbers. Secure remote access via Tailscale keeps the stack off the public internet entirely.

See It in Action

AI-generated overviews of the LEX tooling stack — the design philosophy, how PLEX and The Estimator work, and why these tools were built for the limited energy trade.

Get in Touch

Contact

Professional inquiries, tool feedback, and industry conversation are welcome.

Email
stovey@limitedenergy.net
LinkedIn
linkedin.com/in/mctovey

Independent consulting for AI-enabled engineering workflows and smart automation. PLEX and The Estimator are free tools built from real engineering problems.

The views, tools, and content on this site are personal and independent. They do not represent the positions, products, or work product of any current or former employer. No warranty is expressed or implied regarding the accuracy, completeness, or fitness for purpose of any tool, calculation, or specification language presented here. All output is provided for preliminary engineering and coordination only and must be reviewed and stamped by a qualified professional of record before construction use. No liability is accepted for errors, omissions, or downstream use.