PREDICTING HVAC ENERGY CONSUMPTION IN COMMERCIAL BUILDINGS USING MULTIAGENT SYSTEMS

ABSTRACT Energy consumption in commercial buildings has been increasing rapidly in the past decade. The knowledge of future energy consumption can bring significant value to commercial building energy management. For example, prediction of energy consumption decomposition helps analyze the energy consumption patterns and efficiencies as well as waste, and identify the prime targets for energy conservation. Moreover, prediction of temporal energy consumption enables building managers to plan out the energy usage over time, shift energy usage to off-peak periods, and make more effective energy purchase plans. This paper proposes a novel model for predicting heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) energy consumption in commercial buildings. The model simulates energy behaviors of HVAC systems in commercial buildings, and interacts with a multiagent systems (MAS) based framework for energy consumption prediction. Prediction is done on a daily, weekly and monthly basis. Ground truth energy consumption data is collected from a test bed office building over 267 consecutive days, and is compared to predicted energy consumption for the same period. Results show that the prediction can match 92.6 to 98.2% of total HVAC energy consumption with coefficient of variation of the root mean square error (CV-RMSE) values of 7.8 to 22.2%. Ventilation energy consumption can be predicted at high accuracies (over 99%) and low variations (CV-RMSE values of 3.1 to 16.3%), while cooling energy consumption accounts for majority of inaccuracies and variations in total energy consumption prediction

Digital Modeling, Integrated Project Delivery and Industry Transformation: An Australian Case Study

This research is focused on realizing productivity benefits for the delivery of transport infrastructure in the Australian construction industry through the use of building information modeling (BIM), virtual design and construction (VDC) and integrated project delivery (IPD). Specific objectives include: (I) building an understanding of the institutional environment, business systems and support mechanisms (e.g., training and skilling) which impact on the uptake of BIM/VDC; (II) gathering data to undertake a cross-country analysis of these environments; and (III) providing strategic and practical outcomes to guide the uptake of such processes in Australia. Activities which will inform this research include a review of academic literature and industry documentation, semi-formal interviews in Australia and Sweden, and a cross-country comparative analysis to determine factors affecting uptake and associated productivity improvements. These activities will seek to highlight the gaps between current-practice and best-practice which are impacting on widespread adoption of BIM/VDC and IPD. Early findings will be discussed with intended outcomes of this research being used to: inform a national public procurement strategy; provide guidelines for new contractual frameworks; and contribute to closing skill gaps

Interoperability for the design and construction industry through semantic web technology

The domain of architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) has experienced significant improvements with the advent of building information modelling (BIM) applications, which allow AEC specialists to model all information concerning a building design into one three-dimensional building model. Much of these improvements are however generated by the mere availability of such an environment, whereas many more improvements were expected by achieving an appropriate interoperability of information. We are investigating why such an interoperability is not reached fully and consider the semantic web as an alternative approach to reach the targeted interoperability. In this paper, an AEC description framework based on semantic web technology is presented and compared to the BIM approach, after which we indicate how it might solve the issue of interoperability more appropriately. Our evaluation of this investigation indicates the semantic web approach as a valid alternative approach, although considerably more research is needed to show it capable of providing the targeted interoperability of information in the AEC domain

Collaborative multidisciplinary learning : quantity surveying students’ perspectives

The construction industry is highly fragmented and is known for its adversarial culture, culminating in poor quality projects not completed on time or within budget. The aim of this study is thus to guide the design of QS programme curricula in order to help students develop the requisite knowledge and skills to work more collaboratively in their multi-disciplinary future workplaces. A qualitative approach was considered appropriate as the authors were concerned with gathering an initial understanding of what students think of multi-disciplinary learning. The data collection method used was a questionnaire which was developed by the Behaviours4Collaboration (B4C) team. Knowledge gaps were still found across all the key areas where a future QS practitioner needs to be collaborative (either as a project contributor or as a project leader) despite the need for change instigated by the multi-disciplinary (BIM) education revolution. The study concludes that universities will need to be selective in teaching, and innovative in reorienting, QS education so that a collaborative BIM education can be effected in stages, increasing in complexity as the students’ technical knowledge grows. This will help students to build the competencies needed to make them future leaders. It will also support programme currency and delivery

Coordinating occupant behavior for building energy and comfort management using multi-agent systems

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Re-charting Architecture or the End of “Architecture” as We Know It?

As a discipline, the exchange of ideas between architecture and other disciplines or subject areas occurs as a rule rather than an exception. In an attempt to re-chart architecture, mapping the exchange may give a more complete picture as a reflection of architecture itself. In doing so, a survey of the use of the word “architecture” was carried out. Scopus.com was used extensively to explore articles using the word in their abstract, keyword, or title. The finding shows that the word “architecture” is extensively used in nearly all subject areas in Scopus stretching the meaning of architecture to its widest as the organization of things. That “Architecture” itself seems to be diminishing leads to more questions particularly regarding Architectural Education 4.0

digital 3d control room for healthcare

The building process is in an evolutionary phase dictated by the constructive innovations and the digital revolution that has involved the tools and the technical and design contents of the entire life cycle of buildings. In this context, the operators of the sector need to develop organizational models capable of protecting and managing the conceptual and scale transition, between the conceptual framework of the architecture and the subsequent ones of construction, use and management. In the development of complex projects the elaboration of the organizational model is in fact fundamental to reach adequate figurative, performance and qualitative levels by incorporating the necessary contents of environmental, economic and management sustainability of buildings. This text illustrates the development of a horizontal organizational model for the smart and dynamic control of complex buildings through the creation of an innovative digital Web-Based platform capable of integrating Building Information Modeling (BIM) technology with a "Facility Management platform". The project involves experimentation applied to a real case involving the restructuring of a complex building