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Electricity consumption in buildings is one of the major causes of energy usage and knowledge of this can help building owners and users increase energy efficiency and conservation efforts. For Pacific Island countries, building electricity demand data is not readily accessible or available for constructing models to predict electricity demand. This paper starts to fill this gap by studying the case of schools in Fiji. The aim of the paper is to assess the factors affecting electricity demand for grid-connected Fijian schools and use this assessment to build mathematical models (multiple linear regression (MLR) and artificial neural network (ANN)) to predict electricity consumption. The average grid-connected electricity demand in kWh/year was 1411 for early childhood education schools, 5403 for primary schools, and 23,895 for secondary schools. For predicting electricity demand (ED) for all grid-connected schools, the stepwise MLR model shows that taking logarithm transformations on both the dependent variable and independent variables (number of students, lights, and air conditioning systems) yields statistically significant independent variables with an R2 value of 73.3% and RMSE of 0.2248. To improve the predicting performance, ANN models were constructed on both the natural form of variables and transformed variables. The optimum ANN model had an R2 value of 95.3% and an RMSE of 59.4 kWh/year. The findings of this study can assist schools in putting measures in place to reduce their electricity demand, associated costs, and carbon footprint, as well as help government ministries make better-informed policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Organizations managing high-performance computing systems face a multitude of challenges, including overarching concerns such as overall energy consumption, microprocessor clock frequency limitations, and the escalating costs associated with chip production. Evidently, processor speeds have plateaued over the last decade, persisting within the range of 2 GHz to 5 GHz. Scholars assert that brain-inspired computing holds substantial promise for mitigating these challenges. The spiking neural network (SNN) particularly stands out for its commendable power efficiency when juxtaposed with conventional design paradigms. Nevertheless, our scrutiny has brought to light several pivotal challenges impeding the seamless implementation of large-scale neural networks (NNs) on silicon. These challenges encompass the absence of automated tools, the need for multifaceted domain expertise, and the inadequacy of existing algorithms to efficiently partition and place extensive SNN computations onto hardware infrastructure. In this paper, we posit the development of an automated tool flow capable of transmuting any NN into an SNN. This undertaking involves the creation of a novel graph-partitioning algorithm designed to strategically place SNNs on a network-on-chip (NoC), thereby paving the way for future energy-efficient and high-performance computing paradigms. The presented methodology showcases its effectiveness by successfully transforming ANN architectures into SNNs with a marginal average error penalty of merely 2.65%. The proposed graph-partitioning algorithm enables a 14.22% decrease in inter-synaptic communication and an 87.58% reduction in intra-synaptic communication, on average, underscoring the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm in optimizing NN communication pathways. Compared to a baseline graph-partitioning algorithm, the proposed approach exhibits an average decrease of 79.74% in latency and a 14.67% reduction in energy consumption. Using existing NoC tools, the energy-latency product of SNN architectures is, on average, 82.71% lower than that of the baseline architectures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The automotive production sector plays a significant role in the energy consumption of all the industrial sphere, which currently represents approximately 38% of the total global energy use. Especially in production sites with several manufacturing lines working in parallel, the occurrence of failures and anomalies or sudden changes in the production volume may require a re-scheduling of the entire production process. In this regard, a digital twin of each phase of the process would give several indications about the new re-scheduled manufacture in terms of energy consumption and the control strategy to adopt. Therefore, the main goal of this paper is to propose different modeling approaches to a degreasing tank process, which is a preliminary phase at automotive production sites before the application of paint to car bodies. In detail, two different approaches have been developed: the first is a physics-based thermodynamic approach, which relies on the mass and energy balances of the system analyzed, and the second is machine learning-based, with the calibration of several artificial neural networks (ANNs). All the investigated approaches were assessed and compared, and it was determined that, for this application and with the data at our disposal, the thermodynamic approach has better prediction accuracy, with an overall mean absolute error (MAE) of 1.30 °C. Moreover, the model can be used to optimize the heat source policy of the tank, for which it has demonstrated, with historical data, an energy saving potentiality of up to 30%, and to simulate future scenarios in which, due to company constraints, a re-scheduling of the production of more work shifts is required. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite advancements in smart grid (SG) technology, effective load forecasting utilizing big data or large-scale datasets remains a complex task for energy management, planning, and control. The Saudi SGs, in alignment with the Saudi Vision 2030, have been envisioned as future electrical grids with a bidirectional flow of power and data. To that end, data analysis and predictive models can enhance Saudi SG planning and control via artificial intelligence (AI). Recently, many AI methods including deep learning (DL) algorithms for SG applications have been published in the literature and have shown superior time series predictions compared with conventional prediction models. Current load-prediction research for the Saudi grid focuses on identifying anticipated loads and consumptions, on utilizing limited historical data and the behavior of the load's consumption, and on conducting shallow forecasting models. However, little scientific proof on complex DL models or real-life application has been conducted by researchers; few articles have studied sophisticated large-scale prediction models for Saudi grids. This paper proposes hybrid DL methods to enhance the outcomes in Saudi SG load forecasting, to improve problem-relevant features, and to accurately predict complicated power consumption, with the goal of developing reliable forecasting models and of obtaining knowledge of the relationships between the various features and attributes in the Saudi SGs. The model in this paper utilizes a real dataset from the Jeddah and Medinah grids in Saudi Arabia for a full year, 2021, with a one-hour time resolution. A benchmark strategy using different conventional DL methods including artificial neural network, recurrent neural network (RNN), conventional neural networks (CNN), long short-term memory (LSTM), gated recurrent unit (GRU), and different real datasets is used to verify the proposed models. The prediction results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed hybrid DL models, with CNN–GRU and CNN–RNN with NRMSE obtaining 1.4673% and 1.222% improvements, respectively, in load forecasting accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper realizes the simultaneous optimization of a vessel's course and speed for a whole voyage within the estimated time of arrival (ETA), which can ensure the voyage is safe and energy-saving through proper planning of the route and speed. Firstly, a dynamic sea area model with meteorological and oceanographic data sets is established to delineate the navigable and prohibited areas; secondly, some data are extracted from the records of previous voyages, to train two artificial neural network models to predict fuel consumption rate and revolutions per minute (RPM), which are the keys to route optimization. After that, speed configuration is introduced to the optimization process, and a simultaneous optimization model for the ship's course and speed is proposed. Then, based on a customized version of the A* algorithm, the optimization is solved in simulation. Two simulations of a ship crossing the North Pacific show that the proposed methods can make navigation decisions in advance that ensure the voyage's safety, and compared with a naive route, the optimized navigation program can reduce fuel consumption while retaining an approximately constant time to destination and adapting to variations in oceanic conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes the optimal algorithm for controlling the HVAC system in the target building. Previous studies have analyzed pre-selected algorithms without considering the unique data characteristics of the target building, such as location, climate conditions, and HVAC system type. To address this, we compare the accuracy of cooling load prediction using ANN and LSTM algorithms, widely used in building energy research, to determine the optimal algorithm for HVAC control in the target building. We develop a simulation model calibrated with actual data to ensure data reliability and compare the energy consumption of the existing HVAC control method and the two algorithms-based methods. Results show that the ANN algorithm, with a CV(RMSE) of 12.7%, has a higher prediction accuracy than the LSTM algorithm, CV(RMSE) of 17.3%, making it a more suitable algorithm for HVAC control. Furthermore, implementing the ANN-based approach results in a 3.2% cooling energy reduction from the optimal control of Air Handling Unit (AHU) Discharge Air Temperature (DAT) compared to the fixed DAT at 12.8 °C in a representative day. This study demonstrates that ML-based HVAC system control can effectively reduce cooling energy consumption in HVAC systems, providing an effective strategy for energy conservation and improved HVAC system efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wireless sensor network (WSN) is the fastest growing technology that dominates the future world into wireless communication. It is a collection of a number of self-governing sensor nodes responsible to sense, process and manipulate the nodes. The sensor nodes are regulated by a battery where the network gets failed if the battery is dead. Thus, energy is an important factor to be efficiently used. Furthermore, congestion occurs in WSN when the incoming traffic load exceeds the capacity of the network. The major factors that lead to congestion are buffer overflow, varying rates of transmission, packet collision, and many-to-one data transmission. Due to these, the network suffers from packet loss, queuing delay, end-to-end delay, decrease in network lifetime, and increase in energy consumption. Hence, a clustering-based routing protocol is introduced in this paper to improve the performance of the network and reduce congestion. In the proposed method, Power-Efficient Gathering in Sensor Information Systems (PEGASIS) double cluster head with artificial neural network (ANN) is utilized to analyze the overall network lifetime. The proposed technique is comprised of four phases: clustering the network nodes, cluster head (CH) selection, chain formation, and secondary CH (SCH) selection. The sensor nodes are initially clustered with the firefly algorithm in which the cluster heads of each node are elected via an artificial neural network. Meanwhile, chain formation is processed by PEGASIS double cluster head (PDCH) and the SCH is selected through grey wolf optimizer (GWO) to afford equivalent energy utilization between the sensor nodes. The simulation outcomes proved that the proposed method efficiently increases the lifetime of the network and reduces congestion level in WSN. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Direct power control (DPC) is among the most popular control schemes used in renewable energy because of its many advantages such as simplicity, ease of execution, and speed of response compared to other controls. However, this method is characterized by defects and problems that limit its use, such as a large number of ripples at the levels of torque and active power, and a decrease in the quality of the power as a result of using the hysteresis controller to regulate the capacities. In this paper, a new idea of DPC using artificial neural networks (ANNs) is proposed to overcome these problems and defects, in which the proposed DPC of the doubly fed induction generators (DFIGs) is experimentally verified. ANN algorithms were used to compensate the hysteresis controller and switching table, whereby the results obtained from the proposed intelligent DPC technique are compared with both the classical DPC strategy and backstepping control. A comparison is made between the three proposed controls in terms of ripple ratio, durability, response time, current quality, and reference tracking, using several different tests. The experimental and simulation results extracted from dSPACE DS1104 Controller card Real-Time Interface (RTI) and Matlab/Simulink environment, respectively, have proven the robustness and the effectiveness of the designed intelligence DPC of the DFIG compared to traditional and backstepping controls in terms of the harmonic distortion of the stator current, dynamic response, precision, reference tracking ability, power ripples, robustness, overshoot, and stability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: The need to increase the share of renewable energy supply in buildings has been a subject of concern for many authors. Renewable energies can offset building electrical and thermal energy loads, thus reducing constrains on national grid networks. The aim of this paper is to construct, model and optimize a hybrid renewable energy supply system under transient conditions. The supply system consists of solar‐PV panels and vertical axis wind turbines, while batteries are used for energy storage. TRNSYS software is used to model the energy demand of an office building that operates under the average standard building as specified in EnergyPlus software. In order to determine the optimal size of the energy supply system an Artificial Neural Network (ANN) combined with a Sobol algorithm are employed. Two objective functions are developed to: (a) minimize the cost of purchasing solar‐PV panels and wind turbines, and (b) minimize the electricity required from the national grid network. The simulation and optimization results show that the best condition is achieved with 461 panels and one vertical axis wind turbine. At this best condition, the amount of electricity required from the national grid network is 5.55 MWh/year, and this will cost 2.4 $/h. Moreover, 3% of electricity will be obtained from the grid, 31% from batteries and 66% are supplied directly through panels and turbines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The demand for wind energy harvesting has grown significantly to mitigate the global challenges of climate change, energy security, and zero carbon emissions. Various methods to maximize wind power efficiency have been proposed. Notably, neural networks have shown large potential in improving wind power efficiency. In this paper, we provide a review of attempts to maximize wind power efficiency using neural networks. A total of three neural-network-based strategies are covered: (i) neural-network-based turbine control, (ii) neural-network-based wind farm control, and (iii) neural-network-based wind turbine blade design. In the first topic, we introduce neural networks that control the yaw of wind turbines based on wind prediction. Second, we discuss neural networks for improving the energy efficiency of wind farms. Last, we review neural networks to design turbine blades with superior aerodynamic performances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sour water stripping can treat the sour water produced by crude oil processing, which has the effect of environmental protection, energy saving and emission reduction. This paper aims to reduce energy consumption of the unit by strengthening process parameter optimization. Firstly, the basic model is established by utilizing Aspen Plus, and the optimal model is determined by comparative analysis of back propagation neural network (BPNN), radial basis function neural network (RBFNN) and generalized regression neural network (GRNN) models. Then, the sensitivity analysis of Sobol is used to select the operating variables that have a significant influence on the energy consumption of the sour water stripping system. Finally, the particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm is used to optimize the operating conditions of the sour water stripping unit. The results show that the RBFNN model is more accurate than other models. Its network structure is 5-66-1, and the expected value has an approximately linear relationship with the output value. Through sensitivity analysis, it is found that each operating parameter has an impact on the sour water stripping process, which needs to be optimized by the PSO algorithm. After 210 iterations of the PSO algorithm, the optimal system energy consumption is obtained. In addition, the cold/hot feed ratio, sideline production position, tower bottom pressure, hot feed temperature, and cold feed temperature are 0.117, 18, 436 kPa, 146 °C, and 35 °C, respectively; the system energy consumption is 5.918 MW. Compared with value of 7.128 MW before optimization, the energy consumption of the system is greatly reduced by 16.97%, which shows that the energy-saving effect is very significant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper introduces a new idea for overhead transmission line online monitoring. The basis of the paper has been developed upon years of research conducted by power engineers, and a new advanced transmission line safe operation monitoring system is proposed successfully. Furthermore, we used artificial neural network for diagnosis examples, to prove the feasibility and effectiveness of the advanced transmission line safe operation system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents an analysis of heating expenses in a large social housing stock in the North of France. An artificial neural network (ANN) approach is taken for the analysis of heating consumption data collected over four years in 84 social housing residences containing 13,179 dwellings that use collective heating. Analysis provides an understanding of the influence of both physical and socio-economic parameters on heating expenses and proposes a predictive model for these expenses. The model shows that the heating expenses are influenced by both the buildings' physical parameters and social indicators. Concerning the physical parameters, the most important indicators are the area of the dwellings, followed by the building age and the DPE (energy performance diagnostic). The family size as well as tenant age and income have an important influence on heating expense. The model is then used for establishing a data-based strategy for social housing stock renovation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: The incessant growing of the world's energy consumption and associated greenhouse gases emissions have created tremendous problems to be solved by today's and future generations. As the building sector is one of the biggest energy consumers, reducing its energy consumption is now mandatory. Being able to conceive and built efficient buildings, to effectively manage and operate them, and to rapidly renovate the existing building stock is a challenging task. Neural networks models open new possibilities to address this problem. This paper offers a comprehensive review of the studies that use neural networks for energy‐related applications in the building sector focusing on their application and on the technical characteristics of the network (ie, learning algorithm, number of layers, number of neurons, inputs and output variables, and performance criteria). On the basis of this review, limitations concerning the use of neural networks in the building sector along with existing research gaps and future research directions are identified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Moving toward environmental sustainability in the fruit production systems needs accurate monitoring of the systems in terms of energy flow. In this regard, using regression models (i.e., Cobb–Douglas), Multiple Linear Regression (MLR)), and Artificial Neural Network (ANN), this paper examined the energy flow in the pomegranate orchards in Iran. Unlike other similar studies, in the current research, the cross-validation technique was employed to evaluate how choosing datasets would modify the behavior of the models. The results demonstrated that the total energy consumption and energy efficiency of the pomegranate production were 13,634.13 MJ ha−1 and 1.01, respectively. The results also indicated that among investigated MLR models, the pure-quadratic model had the best performance. Besides, among 13 evaluated ANN-training algorithms, the Bayesian regulation algorithm had the highest accuracy in prediction and the best model consisted of one hidden layer with three neurons (5–3–1 topology) with logarithm sigmoid activation function. The results highlighted that the ANN model (R2 = 0.91) outweighs the MLR model (R2 = 0.86). The results also approved that the proposed ANN model was capable to use different datasets with high generalizability. The results of sensitivity analysis claimed the significant role of water and fuel consumption and consequently, the importance of establishing management policies to optimizing the use of these inputs in the pomegranate orchards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper deals with implementation of artificial neural network in the maximum power point tracking (MPPT) controller algorithm for modern household where electric vehicle (EV) was purchased. The proposed MPPT algorithm was designed to achieve the best possible efficiency of the MPP (maximum power point) tracking and the best possible energy harvesting to charge the EV's battery. The artificial neural networks have strong advantage in fast input to output response of signals and the finding of MPP is faster than in commonly used algorithms. In this article, the optimised simulation model based on artificial neural network will be introduced. The proposed artificial neural network algorithm was designed for non-shielded photovoltaic panels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to develop an artificial neural network (ANN) to predict the energy consumption and cost of cross laminated timber (CLT) office buildings in severe cold regions during the early stage of architectural design. Eleven variables were selected as input variables including building form and construction variables, and the values of input variables were determined by local building standards and surveys. ANNs were trained by the simulation data and Latin hypercube sampling (LHS) method was used to select training datasets for the ANN training. The best ANN was obtained by analyzing the output variables and the number of hidden layer neurons. The results showed that the ANN with multiple outputs presented better prediction performance than the ANN with single output. Moreover, the number of hidden layer neurons in ANN should be greater than five and preferably 10, and the best mean square error (MSE) value was 1.957 x 10³. In addition, it was found that the time of predicting building energy consumption and cost by ANN was 80% shorter than that of traditional building energy consumption simulation and cost calculation method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The demand for electrical energy continues to rise at an alarming rate, while supply is not proportional to power demand. Thus, in order to accomplish appropriate preparation and operation of an electrical power system network, it is crucial to properly assess the present and future consumption of electric power systems. Meeting the electric load needs entails actively anticipating the amount of energy required to meet the subscribers' power demand. To forecast energy demand, many algebraic and artificial intelligence schemes have been used. This paper proposes an improved medium-term forecasting scheme that employs an artificial neural network (ANN). The model was developed and trained with the help of an artificial neuro-fuzzy inference system (ANFIS). The data used, which ranged from 2014 to 2019, was obtained from the University of Nigeria Nsukka's (UNN) research and energy Centre, and the works department of the same university. The model was designed and simulated using MATLAB 2018a, and the results were evaluated using MAPE. The proposed system used a robust machine learning based scheme. Unlike conventional systems, the system demonstrated a MAPE of 4.34% and a correlation of 0.91144315 at predicted and actual loads, as shown in Table 2. The proposed system shows that the predicted loads has 25th and 75th percentiles of 0.58MW and 0.98WM, while that of the actual loads are 0.649MW and 0.936MW. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The energy consumption of a constructed facility is a primary concern as a result of its impact on the total energy expenditure. It has been found that up to 70% of the power consumption in Saudi Arabia are caused by building structures and air conditioning (AC). Energy consumption in government-constructed buildings constitutes a considerable ≈13% of the consumption of the total energy in Saudi Arabia. Therefore, the government of Saudi Arabia initiated the Saudi Energy Efficiency Program (SEEP) that goals to lower the domestic energy severity by roughly 30% by 2030. This paper introduces a study carried out in Eastern Province in Saudi Arabia to identify factors influencing the consumption of energy in school facilities (which are built of concrete in hot and humid climate zones), investigate the correlation between those factors and their impacts on the consumption of energy in school facilities, and finally, develop a prediction model for the energy consumption of school facilities. The study was based on the utilization of 352 real-world datasets of energy consumption of operating schools across Eastern Province in Saudi Arabia. The developed energy prediction model considers eleven identified factors that influence the consumption of energy of constructed schools. The identified factors were utilized as input variables to build the model. A systematic search among different neural network (NN) design architectures was conducted to identify the optimal network model. Validation of the developed model on eight real-world cases demonstrated that the accuracy of the developed model was about 87.5%. Moreover, the findings of this study indicate that the weakest correlation between the input variables was recorded as −0.015 between "type of school" and "AC capacity," while the strongest correlation was recorded as 0.95 between the variables of "number of classrooms" and "total air-conditioned area (sqm)," followed by "total air-conditioned area (sqm)" and "number of students," which was recorded as 0.90. It is worth noting that "AC capacity" was the most significant predictor, which increased exponentially for high values of energy consumption, followed by "total school roof area." The study also found that the age of the schools had a very small impact on energy consumption, although the age of the schools varied from 11 to 51 years. This was probably due to a good maintenance system applied by the Ministry of Education. The implication of the developed prediction model was that the model can be used by the Ministry of Education to predict the energy consumption and its associated cost for public school buildings for the purpose of budget allocation. The model may be utilized as a stand-alone application, or it can be integrated with an existing building information module (BIM)-based system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A Virtual energy assessment (VEA) refers to the assessment of the energy flow in a building without physical data collection. It has been occasionally conducted before the COVID-19 pandemic to residential and commercial buildings. However, there is no established framework method for conducting this type of energy assessment. The COVID-19 pandemic has catalysed the implementation of remote energy assessments and remote facility management. In this paper, a novel framework for VEA is developed and tested on case study buildings at the University of Melbourne. The proposed method is a hybrid of top-down and bottom-up approaches: gathering the general information of the building and the historical data, in addition to investigating and modelling the electrical consumption with artificial neural network (ANN) with a projection of the future consumption. Through sensitivity analysis, the outdoor temperature was found to be the most sensitive (influential) parameter to electrical consumption. The lockdown of the buildings provided invaluable opportunities to assess electrical baseload with zero occupancies and usage of the building. Furthermore, comparison of the baseload with the consumption projection through ANN modelling accurately quantifies the energy consumption attributed to occupation and operational use, referred to as 'operational energy' in this paper. Differentiation and quantification of the baseload and operational energy may aid in energy conservation measures that specifically target to minimise these two distinct energy consumptions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Photovoltaic (PV) power generation systems know widespread in the power generation world due to their production efficiency of clean energy. This system is exposed to several faults and errors during the production process, which reduces the quality and quantity of the produced energy, among the most common defects is partial shading. This paper proposes a simplified method for fault detection based on the generation of residual signals sensitive to these faults. For this detection, we have developed a model of the healthy photovoltaic system based on an artificial neural network (ANN). The output of this model is compared to the PV generator controlled by maximum power point tracking (MPPT) to form a residue used to feed a mechanism dedicated to fault detection. For the detection mechanism, an ANN was used as a fault classifier. The proposed method makes it possible to determine the percentage of partial shading, even in the presence of climate change. The results have been verified and validated using MATLAB/Simulink. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the past century, energy consumption and associated greenhouse gas emissions have increased drastically due to a wide variety of factors including both technological and population-based. Therefore, increasing our energy efficiency is of great importance in order to achieve overall sustainability. Forecasting the building energy consumption is important for a wide variety of applications including planning, management, optimization, and conservation. Data-driven models for energy forecasting have grown significantly within the past few decades due to their increased performance, robustness and ease of deployment. Amongst the many different types of models, artificial neural networks rank among the most popular data-driven approaches applied to date. This paper offers a review of the studies published since the year 2000 which have applied artificial neural networks for forecasting building energy use and demand, with a particular focus on reviewing the applications, data, forecasting models, and performance metrics used in model evaluations. Based on this review, existing research gaps are identified and presented. Finally, future research directions in the area of artificial neural networks for building energy forecasting are highlighted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Load signature is the unique consumption pattern intrinsic to each individual electrical appliance/piece of equipment. This paper focus on building a universal platform to better understand and explore the nature of electricity consumption patterns using load signatures and advanced technology, such as feature extraction and intelligent computing. Through this knowledge, we can explore and develop innovative applications to achieve better utilization of resources and develop more intelligent ways of operation. This paper depicts the basic concept, features of load signatures, structure and methodology of applying mathematical programming techniques, pattern recognition tools, and committee decision mechanism to perform load disaggregation. New indices are also introduced to aid our understanding of the nature of load signatures and different disaggregation algorithms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Frequency stability, as one of the most important issues in the modern power grids, requires more efficient control methods due to the increasing complexity of the power system, high penetration of distributed generation sources as well as high electrical energy consumption. The challenges become more critical in the case of islanded microgrids (MGs), due to existing no traditional ancillary services of the upstream electric power network. Thus, the modern power grids, such as MGs, need advanced regulation methods to keep the generation-consumption balancing. Demand response (DR) is the recently introduced control approach which guarantees continuous contribution of controllable loads in the system frequency control. In this paper, a new online droop-based DR, generalized droop control (GDC), is introduced to apply in islanded MGs frequency control. An artificial neural network is used for online tuning of droop coefficients in the presented GDC framework. The proposed control approach changes controllable active and reactive loads, using a set of equations based on satisfying dynamics. To evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed control method, several scenarios are simulated in which changes of the system frequency and voltage are studied. Results show significant damping of power–frequency fluctuation and a desirable performance of the closed-loop system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Indirect evaporative cooling has garnered considerable attention and research owing to its notable advantages, especially high cooling efficiency and low energy consumption. However, the complexity and diversity of parameters affecting indirect evaporative cooler (IEC) performance necessitate the development of a fast and efficient performance prediction model, which remains a critical research objective. To address the particular challenge, this paper introduces a novel approach that utilizes the principles of neural network theory to construct a predictive model based on backpropagation artificial neural networks (BP-ANN). The developed model is employed to investigate the impact of six main operating parameters of the water spray system on the IEC performance. Wet-bulb efficiency and pressure drop of secondary air channel are utilized as the performance evaluation indexes. The model is rigorously validated by relevant experimental data, enabling a comprehensive analysis of the influence of each parameter on the operational performance of the whole system. The significance of the influential parameters is evaluated through grey relational analysis. Furthermore, a multi-objective optimization approach employing a genetic algorithm (GA) is introduced to effectively determine the optimal operating parameters of the IEC system. The results demonstrate that the whole system can efficiently operate with low energy consumption when the wet-bulb efficiency and pressure drop weights are balanced. The optimal operating parameters include a nozzle pressure of 0.15 MPa, spacing of 85 mm, aperture of 6 mm, count of 11, spray density of 0.85 kg/(s ∙ m2) and air velocity of 2 m/s, at which time the wet-bulb efficiency was 0.85, the pressure drop was 210 Pa, and the coefficient of performance (COP) was 12.4, which demonstrated an efficiency increase of 23.2% in comparison with the base system. The findings of this research significantly contribute to a comprehensive understanding of the influence of water-spray operating conditions on IEC performance, and provide valuable insights for the design and operation of high-efficient IEC systems in practical applications. • The datasets were generated by a laboratory-scale prototype of the IEC system. • The ANN model for IEC considering spray operation was trained and validated. • Effects of nozzle and operation characteristics parameters were investigated. • The significance of the influential parameters was evaluated. • The optimal parameters for IEC were determined based on genetic algorithms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The global greenhouse gas emitted from shipping activities is one of the factors contributing to global warming; thus, there is an urgent need to mitigate the adverse effect of climate change. One of the key strategies is to build a vibrant maritime industry with the use of innovation and digital technologies as well as intelligent systems. The digitization of the shipping industry not only provides a competitive edge to the shipping business model but also enhances ship operational and energy efficiency. This review paper focuses on the big data analytics and machine learning applied to harbour craft vessels with the aim to achieve fuel efficiency. The paper reviews the telemetry system requires for the digitalization of harbour craft vessels, its challenges in installation, the vessel monitoring and data transmission system. The commonly used methods for data cleaning are also presented. Last but not least, the paper considers two types of the machine learning systems, i.e., supervised and unsupervised machine learning systems. The multi-linear regression and hidden Markov model for supervised machine learning system and the artificial neural network, grey box model and long short-term memory model for unsupervised machine learning are discussed, and their pros and cons are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of this paper is to optimize the passive design of newly-built residential buildings in hot summer and cold winter region of China for improving indoor thermal comfort while reducing building energy demand. In this respect, this paper investigates the performance of a representative apartment building in the city of Shanghai and evaluates the optimum solutions by using a developed optimization approach, which includes three major steps of 1) setting the model for multi-objective optimization, 2) sensitivity analysis for reducing the dimension of input variables, and 3) multi-objective optimization by using the Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm II (NSGA-II) coupled with the Artificial Neural Network (ANN), among which a novel indicator for evaluating the annual indoor thermal comfort of residential buildings of Shanghai named Comfort Time Ratio (CTR) is defined based on the modification of Szokolay’s theory in terms of bioclimatic analysis, and the impacts of passive design variables on the indoor thermal comfort and building energy demand in terms of different directions are comprehensively investigated. Results of the multi-objective optimization indicate that the residential buildings of Shanghai have a great potential in comfort-improvement and energy-saving. A series of novel optimal passive design tactics for residential buildings in Shanghai are derived accordingly which could be easily understood and conveniently carried out by the architects in practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multi-energy microgrids (MEM) are a new class of power grids focusing on the distributed form of generation and integrating different energy sectors. The primary idea of MEM is to increase renewable energy share in the final energy demand while maintaining the energy balance at all times. However, integrating renewable technology into the grid has some technical limitations that must be analyzed before being deployed in the real world. This study examines the impact of increasing renewable penetration and portfolio design on a multi-energy microgrid energy system from a technical standpoint. As the accuracy of the system analysis is primarily a factor of modeling accuracy, an artificial neural network-based model is trained and deployed to develop forecasts for solar power generation. The forecasting model is integrated with the EnergyPLAN simulation tool to analyze the multi-energy microgrid system regarding renewable share in primary energy consumption and import/export of energy from the primary grid. The Norwegian energy system is considered a case study, as the energy generation and consumption patterns are interesting from both renewable energy and demand contexts for a cold country. One interesting conclusion is that the portfolio and capacities of coupling components such as combined heat and power plants negatively impact renewable integration, while heat pumps positively impact renewable integration by increasing renewable energy utilization. Additionally, the photovoltaic system size has a high degree of correlation to imports and exports compared to wind generation systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Improved thermal efficiency in energy-intensive metal-reheating furnaces has attracted much attention recently in efforts to reduce both fuel consumption, and CO2 emissions. Thermal efficiency of these furnaces has improved in recent years (through the installation of regenerative or recuperative burners), and improved refractory insulation. However, further improvements can still be achieved through setting up reference values for the optimal set-point temperatures of the furnaces. Having a reasonable expression of objective function is of particular importance in such optimisation. This paper presents a function value-based multi-objective optimisation where the objective functions, which address such concerns as discharge temperature, temperature uniformity, and specific fuel consumption, are dependent on each other. Hooke-Jeeves direct search algorithm (HJDSA) was used to minimise the objective functions under a series of production rates. The optimised set-point temperatures were further used to construct an artificial neural network (ANN) of set-point temperature in each control zone. The constructed artificial neural networks have the potential to be incorporated into a more advanced control solution to update the set-point temperatures when the reheating furnace encounters a production rate change. The results suggest that the optimised set-point temperatures can highly improve heating accuracy, which is less than 1 °C from the desired discharge temperature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite advancements in smart grid (SG) technology, effective load forecasting utilizing big data or large-scale datasets remains a complex task for energy management, planning, and control. The Saudi SGs, in alignment with the Saudi Vision 2030, have been envisioned as future electrical grids with a bidirectional flow of power and data. To that end, data analysis and predictive models can enhance Saudi SG planning and control via artificial intelligence (AI). Recently, many AI methods including deep learning (DL) algorithms for SG applications have been published in the literature and have shown superior time series predictions compared with conventional prediction models. Current load-prediction research for the Saudi grid focuses on identifying anticipated loads and consumptions, on utilizing limited historical data and the behavior of the load’s consumption, and on conducting shallow forecasting models. However, little scientific proof on complex DL models or real-life application has been conducted by researchers; few articles have studied sophisticated large-scale prediction models for Saudi grids. This paper proposes hybrid DL methods to enhance the outcomes in Saudi SG load forecasting, to improve problem-relevant features, and to accurately predict complicated power consumption, with the goal of developing reliable forecasting models and of obtaining knowledge of the relationships between the various features and attributes in the Saudi SGs. The model in this paper utilizes a real dataset from the Jeddah and Medinah grids in Saudi Arabia for a full year, 2021, with a one-hour time resolution. A benchmark strategy using different conventional DL methods including artificial neural network, recurrent neural network (RNN), conventional neural networks (CNN), long short-term memory (LSTM), gated recurrent unit (GRU), and different real datasets is used to verify the proposed models. The prediction results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed hybrid DL models, with CNN–GRU and CNN–RNN with NRMSE obtaining 1.4673% and 1.222% improvements, respectively, in load forecasting accuracy.

Summary: Due to increased environmental pollution and global warming concerns, the use of energy storage units that can be supported by renewable energy resources in transportation becomes more of an issue and plays a vital role in terms of clean energy solutions. However, utilization of multiple energy storage units together in an electric vehicle makes the powertrain system more complex and difficult to control. For this reason, the present study proposes an advanced energy management strategy (EMS) for range extended battery electric vehicles (BEVs) with complex powertrain structure. Hybrid energy storage system (HESS) consists of battery, ultra‐capacitor (UC), fuel cell (FC) and the vehicle is propelled with two complementary propulsion machines. To increase powertrain efficiency, traction power is simultaneously shared at different rates by propulsion machines. Propulsion powers are shared by HESS units according to following objectives: extending battery lifetime, utilizing UC and FC effectively. Primarily, to optimize the power split in HESS, a convex optimization problem is formulated to meet given objectives that results 5 years prolonged battery lifetime. However, convex optimization of complex systems can be arduous due to the excessive number of parameters that has to be taken into consideration and not all systems are suitable for linearization. Therefore, a neural network (NN)‐based machine learning (ML) algorithm is proposed to solve multi‐objective energy management problem. Proposed NN model is trained with convex optimization outputs and according to the simulation results the trained NN model solves the optimization problem within 92.5% of the convex optimization one. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy has a strategic role in the economic and social development of countries. In the last few decades, energy demand has been increasing exponentially across the world, and predicting energy demand has become one of the main concerns in many countries. The residential and commercial sectors constitute about 34.7% of global energy consumption. Anticipating energy demand in these sectors will help governments to supply energy sources and to develop their sustainable energy plans such as using renewable and non-renewable energy potentials for the development of a secure and environmentally friendly energy system. Modeling energy consumption in the residential and commercial sectors enables identification of the influential economic, social, and technological factors, resulting in a secure level of energy supply. In this paper, we forecast residential and commercial energy demands in Iran using three different machine learning methods, including multiple linear regression, logarithmic multiple linear regression methods, and nonlinear autoregressive with exogenous input artificial neural networks. These models are developed based on several factors, including the share of renewable energy sources in final energy consumption, gross domestic production, population, natural gas price, and the electricity price. According to the results of the three machine learning methods applied in our study, by 2040, Iranian residential and commercial energy consumption will be 76.97, 96.42 and 128.09 Mtoe, respectively. Results show that Iran must develop and implement new policies to increase the share of renewable energy supply in final energy consumption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The application of a stationary ultra-capacitor energy storage system (ESS) in urban rail transit allows for the recuperation of vehicle braking energy for increasing energy savings as well as for a better vehicle voltage profile. This paper aims to obtain the best energy savings and voltage profile by optimizing the location and size of ultra-capacitors. This paper firstly raises the optimization objective functions from the perspectives of energy savings, regenerative braking cancellation and installation cost, respectively. Then, proper mathematical models of the DC (direct current) traction power supply system are established to simulate the electrical load-flow of the traction supply network, and the optimization objections are evaluated in the example of a Chinese metro line. Ultimately, a methodology for optimal ultra-capacitor energy storage system locating and sizing is put forward based on the improved genetic algorithm. The optimized result shows that certain preferable and compromised schemes of ESSs' location and size can be obtained, acting as a compromise between satisfying better energy savings, voltage profile and lower installation cost. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, a domestic refrigerator was tested to determine the power consumption for different positions of the shelves. The main contribution of this paper is the application of several strategies to analyze and model the power consumption of a domestic refrigerator when the fresh food shelves are changed of position. First, computer simulations were performed to analyze the power consumption using the moving average, the numerical derivative, and the Fourier transform. These simulations were used to study changes, periodic behaviors, minimum, maximum, and average values for the power consumption. Second, prediction methods were used to model the power consumption, these methods include cubic splines, the bilinear method, and artificial neural networks. With these methods, 2-D color graphs were built to predict the power consumption for any shelves positions. The validation results revealed that the cubic spline method provides the best results. Finally, it can be concluded that the models proposed in this paper provides new insights that can be used to design the internal compartments of the fresh food in order to try reducing the energy consumption.

This paper examines the influence of gross domestic product (GDP) and energy consumption (renewable energy and non-renewable energy) on carbon emissions in European Union (EU) Countries use of panel data from 2000 to 2020. By using Artificial Neural Network (ANN) machine learning computational technique, variables are categorized into input and output parameters. The result from the analyses shows that RMSE values of all variables are significant. Further, the normalized importance obtained from the multilayer perception ANN algorithm highlights the importance of variables and their association. The finding suggests that EU countries should adopt a clean energy strategy and policy for environmental protection without compromising economic growth.

Heavy-duty trucks contribute approximately 20% of fuel consumption in the United States of America (USA). The fuel economy of heavy-duty vehicles (HDV) is affected by several real-world parameters like road parameters, driver behavior, weather conditions, and vehicle parameters, etc. Although modern vehicles comply with emissions regulations, potential malfunction of the engine, regular wear and tear, or other factors could affect vehicle performance. Predicting fuel consumption per trip based on dynamic on-road data can help the automotive industry to reduce the cost and time for on-road testing. Data modeling can easily help to diagnose the reason behind fuel consumption with a knowledge of input parameters. In this paper, an artificial neural network (ANN) was implemented to model fuel consumption in modern heavy-duty trucks for predicting the total and instantaneous fuel consumption of a trip based on very few key parameters, such as engine load (%), engine speed (rpm), and vehicle speed (km/h). Instantaneous fuel consumption data can help to predict patterns in fuel consumption for optimized fleet operations. In this work, the data used for modeling was collected at a frequency of 1Hz during on-road testing of modern heavy-duty vehicles (HDV) at the West Virginia University Center for Alternative Fuels Engines and Emissions (WVU CAFEE) using the portable emissions monitoring system (PEMS). The performance of the artificial neural network was evaluated using mean absolute error (MAE) and root mean square error (RMSE). The model was further evaluated with data collected from a vehicle on-road trip. The study shows that artificial neural networks performed slightly better than other machine learning techniques such as linear regression (LR), and random forest (RF), with high R-squared (R2) and lower root mean square error. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy is considered the most costly and scarce resource, and demand for it is increasing daily. Globally, a significant amount of energy is consumed in residential buildings, i.e., 30–40% of total energy consumption. An active energy prediction system is highly desirable for efficient energy production and utilization. In this paper, we have proposed a methodology to predict short-term energy consumption in a residential building. The proposed methodology consisted of four different layers, namely data acquisition, preprocessing, prediction, and performance evaluation. For experimental analysis, real data collected from 4 multi-storied buildings situated in Seoul, South Korea, has been used. The collected data is provided as input to the data acquisition layer. In the pre-processing layer afterwards, several data cleaning and preprocessing schemes are applied to the input data for the removal of abnormalities. Preprocessing further consisted of two processes, namely the computation of statistical moments (mean, variance, skewness, and kurtosis) and data normalization. In the prediction layer, the feed forward back propagation neural network has been used on normalized data and data with statistical moments. In the performance evaluation layer, the mean absolute error (MAE), mean absolute percentage error (MAPE), and root mean squared error (RMSE) have been used to measure the performance of the proposed approach. The average values for data with statistical moments of MAE, MAPE, and RMSE are 4.3266, 11.9617, and 5.4625 respectively. These values of the statistical measures for data with statistical moments are less as compared to simple data and normalized data which indicates that the performance of the feed forward back propagation neural network (FFBPNN) on data with statistical moments is better when compared to simple data and normalized data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • Developing building cooling forecasting model for energy saving of HVAC system. • Forecasting step-ahead building cooling load by time series prediction. • Forecasting step-ahead building cooling load by Fourier’s law-based analysis. • Improving performance of building cooling load forecasting by ensemble technique. Abstract Short-term load prediction, which forecasts a building’s thermal load with a lead time ranging from seconds to a few days, is essential for not only monitoring and controlling the system operation, but also on-line scheduling. Dynamic cooling load forecasting, which belongs to short-term load prediction, is both meaningful for monitoring the system or fuzzy on-line scheduling and crucial for solving the time-lag problem to meet the heating, ventilation and air-conditioning system’s time-varying cooling loads. Numerous studies have been carried out to develop dynamic load-forecasting models, and great achievements have been made. However, limitations in their applicability persist because most previous models are calendar- and time-based data-driven models that may fail when unexpected issues occur or special schedules are adopted. What’s more, the inputs that were selected passively from the source data pools at hand rather than via active exploration may be insufficient and impair the accuracy of forecasting models. This paper proposes a novel dynamic forecasting model for building cooling loads that combines an artificial neural network with an ensemble approach. Based on physical principles other than the available data source, the inputs are explored actively and are independent from both calendar and time indicators, which make the forecasting model being capable of dealing with irregular occasions and unexpected schedules with high accuracy. A benchmark is proposed that uses the current load Q (t) as a forecasted cooling load Q ^ (t + i) and gives the minimum accuracy requirement for a dynamic forecasting model. The benchmark not only can be used to evaluate dynamic forecasting models that are validated by various case studies, but also ensures that the proposed forecasting model can be applied immediately to heating, ventilation and air-conditioning systems to tackle the time-lag problem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy studies of buildings are becoming more widespread as stakeholders strive to improve energy efficiency and reduce carbon emissions. As a result, there is an increased need for novel numerical techniques to automatically calibrate building energy models (BEMs) for these energy studies. In this paper, a new automated building calibration methodology was developed, which uses a surrogate (i.e. , meta) multilayer perceptron artificial neural network (ANN) to infer unknown building parameters. Typically, in the field of BEM calibration, surrogate models are used as a time-saving technique. Instead of running the building simulation software during each iteration of an optimization search, a surrogate model can approximate the output of the BEM very quickly, leading to much faster optimization of the unknown building parameters. However, we show that, once trained, the surrogate model itself can be used to find the unknown building parameters. Since the surrogate model is differentiable, gradient descent can be used to find the building parameters that minimize the error between true and predicted metered energy consumption. Previous surrogate modeling approaches for calibrating BEMs map only the unknown building parameters to the BEM's output. As a result, they are blind to the effects of other crucial variables like weather and the building's schedules. On the other hand, our surrogate ANN model accounts for these other predictors of energy consumption. With this advantage, our method was able to outperform a powerful black box optimizer when finding 14 unknown building parameter values in a controlled case study with hourly energy data. In a real metered data case study, our ANN method and the black box optimizer performed similarly on average, but our method had less variance in performance across trials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The process of cement manufacturing is both energy intensive and difficult to control. This complicated process results in inefficiencies in energy consumption and variations in cement quality with many complex influencing process factors such as input raw materials, variable fuels, firing conditions including temperature, burning, and reside time. Therefore, in order to address these challenges and investigate the effect of parameters and system optimization, the processes must be modeled first. This predictive model will be used to support process energy use reductions while maintaining and improving product quality. This article presents a study on the use of machine learning models to predict clinker kiln flow rate based on process parameters. The study tested different models such as linear regression, Extra Trees regressor, random forest, K-nearest neighbor, XGB regressor, and neural network and found that the linear regression model performed the best due to its ability to handle overfitting pretty well using dimensionally reduction techniques, regularization, and cross-validation. In fact, the predictive model found enable to predict kiln feed rate at an early stage based on a total of 91 significant input parameters and enable to make future suggestions for action to optimize the control of the kiln process. The findings have significant implications for the process and operation related to the kiln performances which implies potential reduction in terms of energy consumption and gas emissions and improvement of operational efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems are the second largest energy consumers on cruise ships after the propulsion system. As a kind of HVAC system, active chilled beam (ACB) systems have been widely used for cabin service due to their performance of energy efficiency and good thermal comfort. However, conventional control strategies for ships' ACB systems are not intelligent enough and cannot balance energy consumption and cabin comfort during the voyages of ships. This study developed an optimal control strategy for cabins' ACB systems. First, a simulation environment considering dynamic conditions is established in TRNSYS. Second, an artificial neural network model is utilized to predict the energy consumption of the ACB system, while the predicted percentage dissatisfied is adopted to represent cabins' thermal discomfort. Third, an improved multi-objective salp swarm algorithm is proposed to dynamically minimize both energy consumption and thermal discomfort. A TRNSYS–MATLAB co-simulation testbed is established to simulate the cabins served by an ACB system on a small cruise ship navigating from Hong Kong to Shanghai for validation tests and a comparison study. Compared to the conventional strategies, the proposed strategy can achieve a maximum energy savings of 12% while maintaining a predicted mean vote index less than 0.5, meeting the comfort requirements set by ASHRAE. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy-optimal adaptive cruise control (EACC) is becoming increasingly popular due to its ability to save energy. Considering the negative impacts of system noise on the EACC, an improved modified model predictive control (MPC) is proposed, which combines the Sage-Husaadaptive Kalman filter (SHAKF), the cubature Kalman filter (CKF), and the back-propagation neural network (BPNN). The proposed MPC improves safety and tracking performance while further reducing energy consumption. The final simulation results show that the proposed algorithm has a stronger energy-saving capability compared to previous studies and always maintains an appropriate relative distance and relative speed to the vehicle in front, verifying the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The existing nodes of IoT networks are very small in size, deployed for long periods, and have very limited resources, which means that an IoT network must be very energy efficient to survive for a long time. Therefore, finding optimal routing techniques that lead to better data sharing without wasting energy can lead to more energy savings. This is an optimization problem, which means that we need to use optimization algorithms to find the optimal path in an IoT network. Some of the optimization algorithms are called meta-heuristic algorithms, these algorithms are inspired by nature, such as Artificial Neural Networks (ANN), which are Gradient methods to find the most suitable solution for a given problem. Our next algorithm is Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO). If the search combination of both algorithms is used in parallel, the search power will increase and better answers will be found in less time. For this reason, we suggest using a combination of the above algorithms. This idea is a combination of two optimization algorithms, PSO (Particle Swarm Optimization) and ANN (Neural Network) to optimize routing and reduce latency when sending information between IoT nodes in an IoT system. The proposed protocol is focused on optimizing energy consumption and execution time with the help of the GA-PSO algorithm based on routing-based clustering. Finally, to evaluate the proposed protocol, it was simulated using C++ software and compared with the method presented in the reference article based on the enhanced Ant Colony Algorithm, and the results show the efficiency of the proposed method in terms of energy consumption and execution time. The results show that in the presented algorithm, the execution time has been reduced to almost a quarter of the execution time in the algorithm of the reference article. Also, the results showed that our proposed method consumed 20 kJ less energy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research provides an insight on the performances of machine learning (ML)-based algorithms for the estimation of the energy consumption in metal forming processes and is applied to the radial-axial ring rolling process. To define the mutual influence between ring geometry, process settings, and ring rolling mill geometries with the resulting energy consumption, measured in terms of the force integral over the processing time (FIOT), FEM simulations have been implemented in the commercial SW Simufact Forming 15. A total of 380 finite element simulations with rings ranging from 650 mm < DF < 2000 mm have been implemented and constitute the bulk of the training and validation datasets. Both finite element simulation settings (input), as well as the FI (output), have been utilized for the training of eight machine learning models, implemented with Python scripts. The results allow defining that the Gradient Boosting (GB) method is the most reliable for the FIOT prediction in forming processes, being its maximum and average errors equal to 9.03% and 3.18%, respectively. The trained ML models have been also applied to own and literature experimental cases, showing a maximum and average error equal to 8.00% and 5.70%, respectively, thus proving once again its reliability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper deals with the problem of determining a useful energy budget for a mobile robot in a given environment without having to carry out experimental measures for every possible exploration task. The proposed solution uses machine learning models trained on a subset of possible exploration tasks but able to make predictions on untested scenarios. Additionally, the proposed model does not use any kinematic or dynamic models of the robot, which are not always available. The method is based on a neural network with hyperparameter optimization to improve performance. Tabu List optimization strategy is used to determine the hyperparameter values (number of layers and number of neurons per layer) that minimize the percentage relative absolute error (%RAE) while maximize the Pearson correlation coefficient (R) between predicted data and actual data measured under a number of experimental conditions. Once the optimized artificial neural network is trained, it can be used to predict the performance of an exploration algorithm on arbitrary variations of a grid map scenario. Based on such prediction, it is possible to know the energy needed for the robot to complete the exploration task. A total of 128 tests were carried out using a robot executing two exploration algorithms in a grid map with the objective of locating a target whose location is not known a priori by the robot. The experimental energy consumption was measured and compared with the prediction of our model. A success rate of 96.093% was obtained, measured as the percentage of tests where the energy budget suggested by the model was enough to actually carry out the task when compared to the actual energy consumed in the test, suggesting that the proposed model could be useful for energy budgeting in actual mobile robot applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Buildings account for a majority of the primary energy consumption of the human society, therefore, analyses of building energy consumption monitoring data are of significance to the discovery of anomalous energy usage patterns, saving of building utility expenditures, and contribution to the greater environmental protection effort. This paper presents a unified framework for the automatic extraction and integration of building energy consumption data from heterogeneous building management systems, along with building static data from building information models to serve analysis applications. This paper also proposes a diagnosis framework based on density-based clustering and artificial neural network regression using the integrated data to identify anomalous energy usages. The framework and the methods have been implemented and validated from data collected from a multitude of large-scale public buildings across China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent advances in Internet of Things (IoT) enabled technologies allow the intelligent sensor systems to effectively and efficiently observe and identify human behaviour in many applications, particularly in energy consumption and healthcare sectors. One typical case is that how to use IoT technologies to understand human water use behaviour for improved and sustained hygiene practice. Traditionally, static behaviour intervention models are widely utilised to simulate behaviour intervention process over time. These static methods can predict targeted human behaviour reasonably well, but lack of capabilities on understanding and responding behaviour change process in IoT environments. In this study, the authors proposed a dynamic behaviour intervention model for predicting household water user behaviour for improved hygiene practices. This model is based on an expanded theory of planned behaviour (ETPB), and adopted structure equation model approach and control engineering concept. A case study of household water consumption model using artificial neural network is utilised to evaluate intervention trend of proposed ETPB dynamic behaviour model with system parameter identification. The ETPB dynamic model has been proved to be effective for modelling human behaviour intervention process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: Eggshell concrete is a novel green material that aids the recycling of eggshell powder (ESP) waste while decreasing the environmental damage due to higher manufacture to develop sustainable energies. Nevertheless, current investigations on eggshell concrete are limited, and the results might vary according to admixture design variations. Despite the fact that the design of experiments is utilized to simplify and optimize the research of sustainable energies, the studies employing eggshell concrete are still uncommon. The powdered egg shells were employed as fine concrete aggregate as a tool of sustainable energies. The flexural and compressive strength of concrete with (5%, 10%, and 15%) and without egg shell are examined, and the findings are predicted by artificial neural network (ANN) and genetic algorithm (GA) as a hybridized model of ANN‐GA. The contour plot research revealed that eggshell powder boosted the energy stability in an appropriate replacement proportion of 5% to 10%. Conversely, for mix designs with a larger water ratio, the partial substitution with eggshell powder is preferable. The findings demonstrate that with 5% ESP replacement, the strengths were greater than in control concrete, indicating that 5% ESP is an ideal content for maximal strength. Furthermore, in terms of transport qualities, the performance of ESP concretes was equivalent to control concrete up to 15% ESP substitution. The statistical regression indices as determination coefficient (R2) and root‐mean‐square error demonstrated that the ANN‐GA model is an effective tool for formulating and predicting the flexural and compressive strength of eggshell concrete to develop sustainable energies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, the contrast against energy waste and pollution has become mandatory and widely endorsed. Among the many actors at stake, the building sector energy management is one of the most critical. Indeed, buildings are responsible for 40 % of total energy consumption only in Europe, affecting more than a third of the total pollution produced. Therefore, energy control policies of buildings (for example, forecast-based policies such as Demand Response and Demand Side Management) play a decisive role in reducing energy waste. On these premises, this paper presents an innovative methodology based on Internet-of-Things (IoT) technology for smart building indoor air-temperature forecasting. In detail, our methodology exploits a specialized Non-linear Autoregressive neural network for short- and medium-term predictions, envisioning two different exploitation: (i) on realistic artificial data and (ii) on real data collected by IoT devices deployed in the building. For this purpose, we designed and optimized four neural models, focusing respectively on three characterizing rooms and on the whole building. Experimental results on both a simulated and a real sensors dataset demonstrate the prediction accuracy and robustness of our proposed models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]