Scalable investigation of energy usage patterns and saving potential in hotel guestrooms: Focused on occupancy states and electrical installations

Abstract

In hotel guestrooms, under the category of non-stationary-operated building, energy usage patterns can vary significantly depending on occupant behaviors and preferences, making it challenging to formulate feasible energy-saving strategies. To address the challenge, this study proposes a scalable approach to investigate energy usage patterns and saving potential in hotel guestrooms, in which endogenous parameters (occupancy states and electrical installations) are comprehensively considered. The data was collected over a year from three guestrooms of Hotel “I” in Hong Kong, including energy usage for different electrical installations, indoor temperature and humidity, and check-in or check-out information. The main findings can be summarized as follows. First, energy usage patterns revealed that the average 15-minute interval energy usage during the check-in state was 56.49 Wh, while during the check-out state, it was 44.03 Wh (77.94% compared to the check-in state). Second, the proposed energy-saving strategies can be applied to the case study room, leading to a reduction of 247.53 kWh, which corresponds to 13.79% of the current annual energy usage (1,794.55 kWh) in the case study room. The proposed scalable approach is expected to contribute to enabling occupant-centric appliance control strategies in hotel guestrooms, depending on occupancy states, which leads to cost savings and promises various benefits, such as enhanced guest services and promotional advantages, such as “Green Hotel”.