FWIW, if this were my startup, I would probably use 10BASE-T1L. The programming model is simple, and cloud or other “smart” integration is natural if the system already uses IP. For that matter, one ought to be able to support wired 10BASE-T1L and wireless Matter/Thread thermostats without much duplicate effort.
BACnet allows multiple PHY implementations, including 802.3
I suspect that 802.3.cg is also kosher, but haven't looked in detail. It's been 5 years since I looked seriously at whether BACnet was the correct solution for a product family.
This could be prototyped on a BeaglePlay :)