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Recently, demand flexibility has been highlighted as a promising distributed resource from the customer side, especially from industrial customers like commercial buildings, capable of providing grid support services. However, the quantification of demand flexibility is a complex process that requires a methodology including the requirements of both the grid operators and the customers. This paper proposes a novel approach to quantify the available demand flexibility of individual buildings, while taking into account the underlying building energy physics. The proposed approach constructs on the operational flexibility concept from the power systems, and extends it to include a comfort domain, identifying different flexibility parameters with the aim of giving a better insight into the flexibility potential of commercial buildings. This method includes a development of building energy simulations to assess the effects of weather variations, construction types, and comfort constrains on demand flexibility. The proposed quantification method has been validated using 15 different office building models and two different climate zones, i.e., the Netherlands and Texas, US. The results presented in this paper suggest that buildings located in a hot climate could offer higher flexibility potential during shorter time ranges, while buildings in a cold climate could offer lower flexibility potential but during longer time ranges. Determining these differences could potentially facilitate the dispatch of flexible demand resources, to assess their real potential, and to schedule demand flexibility between stakeholders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • The aim of this research is to investigate the thermal performance of the prototype building to assess overheating in the summer, particularly the long-term heatwave period in the UK. • To understand the impact of energy efficient technologies on occupants' wellbeing and health in order to identify occupants' thermal comfort level in these types of dwellings. • The study adopts a quantitative research design based on indoor monitoring, in-situ measurements and dynamic simulation modelling. • This clearly indicates that due to this prototype house's structural construction material behaviour in a heatwave and its location (southwest facing orientation), it is susceptible to very high overheating risk. • The results found from the monitoring during a long-term heatwave in the summer of 2018 provided strong evidence for overheating and thereby thermal discomfort in many occupied spaces, particularly on the first floor followed by several spaces on the ground floor. Meanwhile, all the occupied spaces appeared to be well above the acceptable thermal comfort benchmark throughout the data collection period. • To calibrate the building performance, as well as the building materials and components adopted in the model, the measured indoor environment data were scrutinised in conjunction with the IES simulation results. Abstract There is growing evidence that terraced houses—thermally lightweight, well insulated, naturally ventilated with three exposed wall surfaces—are at risk of overheating, especially in south-eastern England. The aim of this study is to evaluate the building performance and develop a reliable building simulation, which will be employed in the second phase of the study: developing affordable and feasible passive design strategies to support the energy-efficient building systems of the construction industry. This paper reports on the results from the first phase of the study where a quantitative methodology, including indoor and outdoor environmental monitoring, in-situ measurements and building simulation modelling, was adopted. The performance of a case study was modelled and simulated via employing Integrated Environmental Solutions (IES) software suite. The results from the base-case were analysed according to the adaptive thermal comfort of Chartered Institution of Building Services Engineers (CIBSE) Technical Memorandum 52 guidelines: The Limits of Thermal Comfort—Avoiding Overheating in European Buildings. The spaces studied within the case study house were observed to exceed the acceptable limits of thermal comfort; particularly, the large bedroom within this zone exceeded the upper limit for overheating up to 11 h daily. Furthermore, the results from the monitoring study indicate a high risk of summertime overheating across all the case study settings, especially during short-term peaks in outdoor temperatures. The main reasons for the problematic thermal performance were identified as well-insulated and fully air-tight building fabric, the lack of sufficient ventilation through the living spaces and excessive heat gains through the composite cladding material. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses annual energy performance of atrium type hotel building in Belgrade. The objective is to examine the impact of the atrium on the hotel building’s energy demands for space heating and cooling. Integrated approach through numerical simulations that include Belgrade climate data and thermal comfort parameters, indicates an optimal model of hotel building with atrium for this area. Building energy simulation is carried out using EnergyPlus simulation engine, as a basic tool in the process of building energy optimization. The methodological approach includes the creation of a hypothetical model of an atrium type hotel building, numerical simulation of energy performances of several design alternatives of the hotel building with atrium, and comparative analysis of the obtained results. The main task of analysis is to change certain parameters in the particular model (for example, building structure, orientation, etc.) and to observe how the changes influence energy performance of the building. The goal of this research is to show that the atrium contributes to the heating and cooling energy savings in the rest of the building, but also that the atrium itself demands a lot of energy for its air-conditioning. The most sustainable solution should be to cover energy demands for atrium by using the renewable energy sources. In this case, the atrium can contribute to the energy efficiency of the hotel building in Belgrade climatic conditions, thus reducing its negative impact on the environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Variable refrigerant flow (VRF) systems vary the refrigerant flow to meet the dynamic zone thermal loads, leading to more efficient operations than other system types. This paper introduces a new model that simulates the energy performance of VRF systems in the heat pump (HP) operation mode. Compared with the current VRF-HP models implemented in EnergyPlus, the new VRF system model has more component models based on physics and thus has significant innovations in: (1) enabling advanced controls, including variable evaporating and condensing temperatures in the indoor and outdoor units, and variable fan speeds based on the temperature and zone load in the indoor units, (2) adding a detailed refrigerant pipe heat loss calculation using refrigerant flow rate, operational conditions, pipe length, and pipe insulation materials, (3) improving accuracy of simulation especially in partial load conditions, and (4) improving the usability of the model by significantly reducing the number of user input performance curves. The VRF-HP model is implemented in EnergyPlus and validated with measured data from field tests. Results show that the new VRF-HP model provides more accurate estimate of the VRF-HP system performance, which is key to determining code compliance credits as well as utilities incentive for VRF technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Occupant behavior is a major contributing factor to building energy consumption. Large discrepancies might occur when occupants with diverse types in terms of behavior patterns reside in an identical building. Moreover, it is vital to derive several kinds of typical occupant behavior that represent the assemblage of occupants in a simplified way as the reference for building designers and energy policy makers. This paper presents a preliminary research on occupant behavior categorization through the building energy simulation, where some typical occupant air-conditioning behavior patterns use in Chengdu, China have been derived from a large-scale questionnaire survey based on the energy consumption levels. These typical occupant behavior patterns could be used as the context for an overview of building energy in a community, as well as the evaluation of building energy-saving technology where occupants are involved. Further efforts are required in the algorithm of dividing occupant behavior into typical patterns, the validation of the classification results, and the analysis of other behaviors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Traditionally, in building energy modeling (BEM) programs, occupant behavior (OB) inputs are deterministic and less indicative of real world scenarios, contributing to discrepancies between simulated and actual energy use in buildings. This paper presents a new OB modeling tool, with an occupant behavior functional mock-up unit (obFMU) that enables co-simulation with BEM programs implementing functional mock-up interface (FMI). The components detailed in the development of the obFMU include an overview of the DNAS (drivers-needs-actions-systems) ontology and the occupant behavior eXtensible Markup Language (obXML) schema, in addition to details on the creation of the obFMU that contains the co-simulation interface, the data model and solvers. To demonstrate functionality of the tool, three examples of occupant behaviors were simulated, including: (1) turning on and off lights, (2) opening and closing windows, and (3) turning on and off the air conditioners. The obFMU can be used via co-simulation with all building simulation programs that implement the FMI, thus users are not limited to a particular tool. Another advantage is the use of obXML schema to represent occupant behavior, standardize the description of occupant behavior enabling information exchange. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Model predictive control (MPC) has been studied in the building science realm for about three decades. However, the following two aspects of the building control have not been studied thoroughly in MPC research. One is the impact of the mixed-mode cooling system on the active heating ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) energy consumption, and the other is the differences of individual thermal comfort preference and its impact on energy. This paper proposes an occupant-oriented mixed-mode EnergyPlus predictive control system to optimize HVAC energy consumption while meeting the individual thermal comfort preference. A web-based dashboard is implemented in the test-bed building for three months to collect individual thermal comfort preference data. The data analysis results suggest that occupants have various tolerances and preferences about thermal comfort. The simulation results show that, during one week of a typical swing season, the mixed-mode system further reduces the active HVAC energy consumption, and the diversified occupant thermal comfort preference has significant impact on HVAC energy consumption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper introduces a Human and Building Interaction Toolkit (HABIT) for simulating the thermally adaptive behaviors and comfort of office occupants alongside building energy consumption. The toolkit uses the Building Controls Virtual Test Bed (BCVTB) to co-simulate a field-tested, agent-based behavior model with an EnergyPlus medium office model. The usefulness of the toolkit is demonstrated through a series of zone and building-level case study simulations that examine the wisdom of pairing local heating and cooling options with strategic thermostat set point offsets, judging from the energy, Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ), and cost perspectives. Results generally suggest that trading efficient local heating/cooling options for whole space conditioning has both energy and comfort benefits, saving up to 28% of monthly HVAC energy while improving the acceptability of thermal conditions in a Philadelphia climate. Nevertheless, cost analysis shows that the fuel source of conserved energy must be considered – particularly in the case of personal heater use, which adds to electric plug loads and associated utility and CO 2 emissions cost penalties. Moreover, costs from even small changes in simulated occupant productivity tend to overwhelm energy costs, suggesting the need to improve the accuracy and precision of available productivity models across multiple seasons and climates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In tropical countries such as India, increasing the roof albedo helps to reduce the heat ingress through the roof. This further reduces air-conditioning energy consumption in conditioned buildings and increases comfort in unconditioned buildings. In order to help users determine the benefits of high albedo roofs under varying conditions, a simple calculator has been developed. Parameters such as location, building type, roof area, and surface properties of the roof are taken as inputs. Annual EnergyPlus simulations are performed for the given parameters and the results are displayed in both graphical and tabular formats. It also calculates the simple payback by comparing a given base case roof albedo with the proposed roof albedo. The calculator can perform comfort simulations for unconditioned buildings and simulates measures including a radiant barrier system and under deck roof insulation. The calculator also runs a parametric simulation between insulation thickness and roof albedo to find an optimum roof insulation thickness based on incremental internal rate of return. This paper presents the features of the cool roof calculator and the type of analysis that can be performed using the cached results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The building industry nowadays is facing two major challenges – the increased concern for energy reduction and the growing need for comfort improvements. These challenges have led many researchers to develop a personalized conditioning system. Personalized conditioning aims to create a microclimate zone around a single workplace. In this way the energy is deployed only where it is actually needed, and the individual needs for thermal comfort are fulfilled. In recent years personalized conditioning has received a lot of attention in research publications. This paper reviews the impact of different personalized conditioning systems on thermal comfort and building energy performance. In the reviewed publications, it was demonstrated that thermal comfort can be well maintained at ambient temperatures that are 4–5K higher as well as lower than the temperatures recommended by current standards. Personalized conditioning also allows reduction in energy consumption due to an increased cooling setpoint, a decreased heating setpoint, or a decreased ventilation rate of the background system. Energy simulations show that reductions of up to 60% can be achieved. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Energy consumption of buildings depends significantly on the criteria used for the indoor environment and building design and operation. The environmental factors that define the indoor environmental quality are: thermal comfort, indoor air quality, acoustic comfort and visual comfort. This paper approaches the numerical prediction of thermal comfort in closed spaces on the basis of PMV–PPD model, and its testing to asymmetric or nonuniform thermal radiation, as well as the indoor air quality simulation and control. The following are developed: a computation and testing model of thermal comfort in buildings, a computational model for indoor air quality numerical simulation, as well as a methodology to determine the outside airflow rate and to verify the indoor air quality in rooms, according to the European Standard CEN 1752. Also, the thermal comfort criteria for design of heating systems, the relationship between thermal environment and human performance, as well as the influence of carbon dioxide on human performance and productivity are presented. The performance of the developed computational models, implemented in two computer programs, is illustrated by using some numerical comparative applications for two building construction types. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Presently the essential research trend for sustainable buildings is the use of renewable energy sources and the development of new techniques of energy storage. Phase change materials (PCMs) may store latent heat energy in addition to the typical sensible energy capacity of current building materials, allowing to store significantly more energy during the phase change process (solid to liquid and vice versa). The incorporation of PCMs into building envelope solutions takes advantage of solar energy, contributing to the overall reduction of energy consumption associated to use of the air conditioning systems. This paper presents and discusses research developed in two main components: experimental testing and numerical simulation of a building component with PCM incorporation. The main goal of the experimental testing carried out was to evaluate the effect of the incorporation of PCM macro encapsulated into a typical Portuguese clay brick masonry enclosure wall. It is evaluated the influence of the phase change process of the PCM over the attenuation and time delay of the temperature fluctuations for indoor spaces. The experimental results allowed the calibration and validation of the numerical model, enabling to carry out parametric studies with different PCMs quantity analysing consequent temperature damping and time delay. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]