Typical academic building energy model development and energy saving evaluation using occupant-based control

Abstract

Studies on occupant-based controls focused on office buildings have been increasing over the past decade because of the significant energy saving potential they can offer in buildings. However, there are very few studies that focus on academic buildings at colleges and universities, which represent a significant number of buildings in the U.S. This paper aims to develop typical academic building models and use these models to evaluate the energy savings potential of implementing occupant-based control (OBC) using EnergyPlus. Four types of typical university-level academic building models were determined based on cluster analysis, including Office-dominated, Laboratory-dominated, Study Room-dominated, and Mixed-use. The occupancy schedules were updated to include stochastic occupancy schedules to represent academic building use. Next, the baseline and proposed models were built. The proposed model uses OBC, resetting the temperature schedule and minimum outdoor air flow schedule based on occupancy, following the current recommendations of ASHRAE 90.1, and 62.1. To demonstrate the use of this developed model, it was run using ASHRAE Climate Zone 5A climate conditions. Results show that there is significant energy saving potential for academic buildings with the implementation of OBC, including an HVAC energy savings of 35%–51% using occupancy presence data for HVAC controls, and a further energy saving increase (3–9%) using occupancy counts for HVAC controls. The results of this work can be used to evaluate other energy saving measures, and aid building designers and operators in making informed decisions in applying appropriate control strategies to optimize building energy systems, as well as predict energy use and demand.