Component Analysis of Thermally Activated Building System in Residential Buildings

Abstract

The packaged terminal air conditioner, the typical cooling system for the residential buildings, consumes a large amount of electricity in a short period time during peak hours. In order to reduce the peak load and conserve the electricity, the thermally activated building system can be used as a secondary system to handle the partial cooling load. However, the thermally activated building system may cause condensation and under-cooling. Thus, design of both systems should be performed with careful investigation in characteristics of both systems to amplify the advantages. Since the thermally activated building system has the time-delay effect which may cause under-cooling, the system is designed to handle the base load of the building. Hence, simple simulation with EnergyPlus was performed to observe the characteristics of cooling load in residential buildings. Once the possible range of the load handling ratio of the thermally activated building system was decided, characteristics of system was analyzed in terms of hardware component and operation parameters. The hardware components were analyzed in plant and system aspects and the operation parameter was evaluated in the thermal comfort aspect. As the load handling ratio increased, the thermal comfort increased due to the lower radiant mean temperatures. Within the range of thermal comfort, the several adjustments were made in setpoint temperature and electricity consumptions of difference cases were observed to decide which components and parameters were important for designing the systems.