SEARCH · Engineering Papers

Results for “efficient buildings”

Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

SourceResearch connectionFrom yearThrough year

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 37 records · Page 2

All sources NASA NTRS DOE OSTI

DOE OSTI2020

Editorial for Special Issue: Grid-Interactive Efficient Buildings - Part 1

We are pleased to present starting with this volume of ASME Journal of Engineering for Sustainable Buildings and Cities (JESBC), a series of peer-reviewed papers related to some of ongoing research projects and applications of Grid-interactive Efficient Buildings (GEBs). As part of a new program initiated by the Building Technology Office (BTO) with the US Department of Energy (DOE), GEBs are characterized as highly energy-efficient buildings that are equipped with smart technologies and distributed energy resources that can be dynamically controlled to meet grid needs and minimize electricity system costs, while meeting occupants’ comfort and productivity requirements. In simple terms,DOE defines GEBs as efficient, connected, smart, and flexible buildings. The GEB technologies touch on the main topical areas of JESBC aimed at fostering sustainable buildings and cities by providing results of evaluation studies and demonstration projects. Indeed, one of the main goals for JESBC is to disseminate solutions to enhance the built environment energy efficiencies, low carbon services, inter-connectivity services, resilient multi-services, and healthy and comfortable living spaces.

buildings↗

DOE OSTI2025

Model-Free Control of Grid-Interactive Efficient Buildings Under Communication Time Delays

Grid-interactive efficient buildings (GEBs) have recently been used to enhance the reliability and stability of the electric grid through demand response (DR) programs. However, most existing DR control strategies require accurate modeling of the various building thermostatically controlled loads (TCLs) and are computationally expensive. To address these challenges, a model-free control (MFC)-based strategy has recently been introduced for coordinating and controlling GEBs. MFC is a data-enabled control strategy that is computationally efficient and does not require the analytical models of the various building equipment. In this paper, we numerically investigate the impact of communication time delays on the performance of MFC in maintaining the TCLs' temperatures within the desired comfort levels while meeting the assigned power allocation constraint.

Telsang, Bhagyashri [University of Tennessee, Knox↗

DOE OSTI2024

Optimizing Grid-interactive Efficient Building Designs with Stacked Value Streams

Grid-interactive efficient buildings (GEBs) are those characterized by the combination of energy efficiency and demand flexibility with smart technologies and communications to not only deliver greater affordability and comfort to buildings, but also help utilities manage grid operations and lower system costs. This paper presents an innovative techno-economic assessment framework to effectively examine different GEB design options, explore various use cases, define technically achievable benefits, and thereby assist in informed decision-making. In particular, building load flexibility, thermal storage, and battery energy storage are considered. Advanced optimal dispatch problem is formulated to maximize the stacked value streams from multiple, competing use cases, subject to the physical capabilities and operational flexibility associated with different designs and configurations. Comprehensive case studies were performed for a real-world building to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of different GEB designs and offer in-depth insights. It was found that the proposed assessment method could effectively capture the costs and benefits linked to each GEB design option. Furthermore, the study revealed that outage mitigation and demand response are the two most significant sources of benefits for GEBs.

Ma, Xu↗

DOE OSTI2022

Making Grid-interactive Efficient Buildings a “Win” for Both Customers and Utilities

Buildings account for more than 70% of U.S. electricity use and at least one-third of U.S. economy-wide CO2 emissions. Changing the timing and overall amount of electricity consumption in buildings would significantly reduce energy costs to consumers and facilitate the transition to a decarbonized economy. Grid-interactive efficient buildings (GEBs) incorporate energy efficiency, smart technologies, and active use of distributed energy resources (DERs) to provide these benefits. As the link between the customer and the power system, utilities are central to widespread deployment of GEBs. Yet, despite the significant cost savings and operational benefits of GEBs for utilities, deployment has remained limited. This paper explores emerging models for enabling utilities to facilitate GEB adoption. Building off foundational research conducted to develop the U.S. DOE’s A National Roadmap for Grid-Interactive Efficient Buildings, we describe the most novel recent examples of ways in which utilities and regulators have made demand-side innovation a win for both the customer and the utility. Emerging concepts include: (1) performance incentive mechanisms to align GEB deployment with utility financial motivations, (2) the use of subscription pricing (i.e., fixed monthly bills) to promote load flexibility and energy efficiency, (3) rate-basing utility-controlled behind-the-meter assets, and (4) coupling energy efficiency and load flexibility with electrification proposals to ensure that customer benefits are maximized. The paper concludes with a discussion about prospects for widespread GEB deployment and utilization by utilities, and how to scale efforts.

Satchwell, Andrew↗

DOE OSTI2021

All-Digital Plug and Play Passive RFID Sensors for Energy Efficient Building Control

This is the final report for the project “All-Digital Plug and Play Passive RFID Sensors for Energy Efficient Building Control”, funded by DOE, and performed by Clemson University, Phase IV Engineering and Harvard University from October 1, 2016 to December 31, 2020. The main objective of this project is to develop, demonstrate and pre-commercialize a novel, plug & play, battery-free, wireless sensor technology to enable low-cost (<$10 per node) indoor and outdoor temperature and humidity measurement for energy efficient building controls and operations. The proposed technology is based on the novel concept of all-digital sensing and its seamless integration with the passive RFID technology. This project focuses on the design, fabrication, material optimization, interrogation electronics, validation, and demonstration of the novel sensor nodes for building applications. The specific objectives of this research program include: (1) Design, fabricate and optimize a compact, robust, and high-resolution digitizer, which could convert rotation angle into digital numbers. (2) Develop the multi-physics-based modeling and simulation of the temperature/humidity transducer to derive a rational design of the architecture, dimension, structure, materials (i.e., mechanical, electrical, thermal and hygroscopic) properties and functions of the sensor node. (3) Design, fabricate and optimize the bi-material based humidity sensitive coil which could linearly transduce the environmental relative humidity variations to rotation angles. (4) Design, fabricate and optimize an UHF RFID platform which could support long-range passive wireless communications of 8-bit digital numbers. (5) Design, fabricate and optimize the miniaturized all-digital sensor using MEMS technology. (6) Validate the integrated all-digital sensing system in a real building environment to test the system’s performance.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗

DOE OSTI2020

Semantic Interoperability to Enable Smart, Grid-Interactive Efficient Buildings

Achieving a widespread transition to grid-interactive, efficient buildings (GEBs) depends critically on there being sufficient interoperability among connected building systems. While many critical elements already exist at the technical interoperability level (TCP/IP, BACnet, etc.), a lack of interoperability in the semantic level hinders streamlined integration of interdependent applications. Semantics refers to expressing information about “things” in a way that can be consistently understood by applications. Key components of formalized semantics include identifying what a “thing” is (its “type”), defining general information about that “thing” (its characteristics or properties), and defining the appropriate relationships of that “thing” to other “things” (its function or role in a larger system). Although this might seem initially trivial, the success of smart building applications is highly dependent on maintaining consistent self-descriptive notions of the “things”. Without semantic interoperability, it is technically difficult, labor-intensive, and cost-prohibitive to enable three key objectives of GEBs: optimizing performance, automatically identifying and diagnosing faults, and delivering grid services. Industry, academia, and standards bodies have invested effort in developing information models to facilitate semantic interoperability, however, they have not been widely adopted across the U.S. commercial building portfolio. This paper will present a pathway to drive semantic interoperability through a three-pronged approach to be led by the DOE Building Technologies Office in partnership with NIST and multiple national laboratories comprising: 1) industry engagement and coordination across existing efforts; 2) a semantic interoperability standard that empowers building owners to identify and require interoperable attributes when procuring equipment and applications; 3) tools to assist in implementation and a test framework to verify compliance of products with semantic interoperability specifications. This approach is designed to accelerate the timeline for adoption of semantic interoperability specifications. The intent is to reduce soft costs associated with implementing advanced controls, fault detection and diagnostics, and other smart building technologies and use cases as a necessary step in achieving an energy efficient smart grid future.

30 DIRECT ENERGY CONVERSION↗

DOE OSTI2020

Semantic Interoperability to Enable Smart, Grid-Interactive Efficient Buildings

Bergmann, Harry↗

DOE OSTI2023

System modeling for grid-interactive efficient building applications

Despite the abundance of research applications of system modeling in grid-interactive efficient buildings (GEBs), the transfer of those applications to real-world practices is still in its early stages. This is partially due to the lack of a summary on how system modeling should be established for a given application of GEBs. Here, we fill this gap by providing an extensive survey of the literature on system modeling for different GEBs that have been produced in the past decade. This survey involves over 300 relevant journal articles from the building community, the power system community, and the society of control. Specifically, we first identified key requirements of system modeling for GEBs based on various types of applications discussed in those publications. We then summarized the system modeling applications from those publications, in terms of their assumptions, modeling approach, and simulation. After that, we analyzed different assumptions made for various applications, the extent to which those modeling approaches satisfied the key requirements, and how those approaches can be scaled up for large-scale applications, which are quite common in GEBs. In addition, we gave insights on how to use system modeling for different applications in GEBs. At the end, we provided recommended directions for future studies to fully unleash the potentials of system modeling to support GEBs.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗

DOE OSTI2021

Building Efficiency Targeting Tool for Energy Retrofits (BETTER) Web Application (BETTER Web App) v1.0

The Building Efficiency Targeting Tool for Energy Retrofits (BETTER) V.1.0 web application identifies cost-saving energy and emissions reductions in buildings and portfolios, without site visits or complex modeling. With minimal data entry, BETTER benchmarks a building's or portfolio's energy use against peers; quantifies energy, cost, and greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction potential; and recommends energy efficiency measures for individual buildings or portfolios, targeting specific energy savings levels. The source code of BETTER's modular, cross-platform analytical engine has previously been disclosed (2019-001) and is available on GitHub and can be adopted, redeveloped, and redistributed freely under an open-source license, allowing users to incorporate BETTER's analytical capabilities into their own software platforms and tools. The BETTER V.1.0 web application, developed with the Django web-framework and the Model-View-Controller (MVC) architecture being disclosed here, provides a graphical user interface (GUI) for any user to view the software tutorials, download and upload a data entry template, configure and run the BETTER analyses, and view the final analytical reports.

Szum, Carolyn↗

DOE OSTI2024

Exploring Grid-Interactive Efficient Building Strategies for Laboratories Through Energy Modeling

Laboratories are often overlooked in demand flexibility research due to constraints on their operations as mission critical facilities, despite the major role they play in an organization's emissions. Laboratories consume 3-4 times more energy than a typical office building and are commonly the largest energy users on any campus. Consequently, most laboratories in the United States are significant contributors to their organization's carbon footprint if their energy needs are met through the combustion of fossil fuels. As part of the initiative to decarbonize laboratories, this report documents an analysis on specifically grid-interactive efficient building (GEB) opportunities for reducing energy costs and emissions associated with laboratory operations. The goal of this initiative was to provide a case study and guidance on how to use OpenStudio and REopt as modeling tools for GEB technologies and strategies in laboratory environments across different climate zones in the United States. The analysis found that efficiency-based GEB strategies had the most significant impact on laboratory operations, while load-shedding and load-shifting GEB strategies produced smaller results. The culmination of these approaches applied across all five climate zones generated on average: 1) 28% energy cost savings and 30% greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reductions, and 2) 4% enhanced energy cost savings under a time-of-use (TOU) pricing schedule compared to traditional pricing schemes. Grid-interactive efficiency building measures were found to produce the greatest energy savings in both electricity and natural gas, particularly in regions with high electrical loads, such as warm climates for cooling. Laboratories that had high levels of natural gas consumption, meanwhile, experienced the greatest emission reductions. The report concludes with an analysis on the opportunities for flexible loads in lab spaces and how small-scale measures in addition to opaque pricing structures for peak demand could become barriers to demand flexibility planning. The report also explores how electrifying laboratory buildings with heat pumps could reduce energy costs and GHG emissions.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗

DOE OSTI2024

Integrated Spatial, Spectral, & Temporal Optical Reflectance System for Precision Occupancy & Location Sensing to Improve Building Energy Efficiency

Buildings consume approximately 35% of the electricity used in the U.S. and building owners can significantly reduce this energy use by providing services like heating, electrical power and lighting only when people are present. The ARPAe funded program titled “INTEGRATED SPATIAL, SPECTRAL, & TEMPORAL OPTICAL REFLECTANCE SYSTEM FOR PRECISION OCCUPANCY & LOCATION SENSING TO IMPROVE BUILDING ENERGY EFFICIENCY” demonstrates how a low cost sensor technology developed for measuring distances can be used to count and locate occupants with a high degree of precision with a very low error rates. This platform tells a building control system where occupants are located (but not who they are) so that energy consuming services can be provided only when the services are needed by building occupants. The original proof of concept involved using low cost, commercially available time-of-flight (TOF) sensors that measure distance, but the performance of these existing sensors was lacking, as they could not operate properly in the presence of sunlight, which blinded the simple TOF sensors and limited their utility in buildings. This project proposed a powerful new class of TOF sensors that used state-of-the-art integrated circuit (IC) fabrication processes that combined advanced photonics with conventional silicon chip circuitry for improved sensor performance. An equally important part of this project was to find ways to maximize occupant count and location accuracy while using the fewest number of sensors possible, in order to keep costs low. By using building blueprints to create digital twins of commercial building spaces, the team developed new algorithms to maximize occupant count and tracking accuracy by properly locating the minimum number of sensors at just the right spots in the building. This capability not only minimizes system costs but also simplified sensor installation and system commissioning. Our simulations of our sensor networks for a range of commercial floorplan designs demonstrated that our installed cost target of $0.08/sqft was attainable, though not fully demonstrated during the project. Finally, we noted that the TOF sensor concept could provide a valuable role in health and eldercare by tracking patients without the need for worn sensors and would be useful for fall detection and other patient safety metrics, including tracking healthcare/patient interactions. We feel that, when fully developed, this new class of sophisticated TOF sensors and support software will be a powerful new approach to improving building energy efficiency based on occupant centric control platforms and will also open new levels of patient safety in healthcare operations. To realize this potential, the team formed the Troy Sensor Company LLC to oversee licensing of the programs patents and continue to seek commercialization of this program’s activity sensing technologies.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗

DOE OSTI2022

Decarbonization Considerations: Grid-Interactive Efficient Buildings [Slides]

The Federal Energy Management Program (FEMP) is helping federal agencies understand how to meet decarbonization goals with grid interactive efficient buildings (GEB). This training will provide attendees with an introduction to GEB, how to work with utilities, and opportunities for federal sites.

22 GENERAL STUDIES OF NUCLEAR REACTORS↗

DOE OSTI2020

Editorial for Special Issue: Grid-Interactive Efficient Buildings—Part 2

This issue of the ASME Journal of Engineering for Sustainable Buildings and Cities (JESBC) is fully dedicated to peer-reviewed papers specific to technologies and applications of Grid-interactive Efficient Buildings (GEBs). As defined by a series of publications by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and outlined in Part 1 of the editorial of JESBC August 2020 issue, GEBs are efficient, connected, smart, and flexible buildings. This GEB special issue covers some technologies and applications for grid-connected buildings and communities. Some of technologies included in the special issue are dynamic insulation systems for building envelopes, building integrated fuel cells, and rooftop PV systems. Furthermore, the issue outlines the designs and cost-benefits of net-zero energy (NZE) buildings and carbon neutral communities in the United States.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗

DOE OSTI2021

Blueprint for Integrating Grid-Interactive Efficient Building (GEB) Technologies into U.S. General Services Administration Performance Contracts

This document provides recommended strategies for increasing implementation of grid-interactive efficient building (GEB) measures in federal performance contracts. This document outlines distributed energy resource screening processes, contractual considerations for GEB technologies within performance contracts, and guidance for integration of GEB analysis procedures and technologies into each phase of a performance contract.

ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATION,↗

DOE OSTI2021

A Stochastic Multi-Criteria Decision-Making Algorithm for Dynamic Load Prioritization in Grid-Interactive Efficient Buildings

Increasing deployment of advanced sensing, controls, and communication infrastructure enables buildings to provide services to the power grid, leading to the concept of grid-interactive efficient buildings. Since occupant activities and preferences primarily drive the availability and operational flexibility of building devices, there is a critical need to develop occupant-centric approaches that prioritize devices for providing grid services, while maintaining the desired end-use quality of service. In this paper, we present a decision-making framework that facilitates a building owner/operator to effectively prioritize loads for curtailment service under uncertainties, while minimizing any adverse impact on the occupants. The proposed framework uses a stochastic (Markov) model to represent the probabilistic behavior of device usage from power consumption data, and a load prioritization algorithm that dynamically ranks building loads using a stochastic multi-criteria decision-making algorithm. The proposed load prioritization framework is illustrated via numerical simulations in a residential building use-case, including plug-loads, air-conditioners, and plug-in electric vehicle chargers, in the context of load curtailment as a grid service. Suitable metrics are proposed to evaluate the closed-loop performance of the proposed prioritization algorithm under various scenarios and design choices. Scalability of the proposed algorithm is established via computational analysis, while time-series plots are used for intuitive explanation of the ranking choices.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗

DOE OSTI2022

Quantifying the Value of Grid-Interactive Efficient Buildings through Field Study: Preprint

Quantifying the annual energy impacts of efficient technologies in commercial buildings has been well established by the building science field. As we move toward enabling grid-interactive efficient buildings (GEB) targeting flexible building operation and carbon reduction, quantification methods to evaluate time-sensitive peak load and emissions impact are much less defined. A number of national laboratories are working to field validate four different GEB software solutions that provide the capability to control multiple building end-use systems in multiple load flexibility modes (i.e., energy efficiency, load shed, load shift, and possible load modulation at the second to sub-second level). To guide the laboratory leads in effective measurement and verification (M&V) practices, two of the laboratories collaborated to define metrics to quantify the impacts of flexible load control on building demand, utility costs, carbon emissions, facility management, and occupant comfort. This paper summarizes the proposed metrics to quantify peak load and emission impacts in the field, decision parameters, approaches to accurately conduct M&V, lessons learned, and outstanding needs and next steps.

ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATION↗

DOE OSTI2020

Grid-Interactive Efficient Buildings: An Introduction for State and Local Governments

This report describes grid-interactive efficient buildings in the context of state and local government interests; highlights trends, challenges and opportunities for demand flexibility; provides an overview of valuation and performance assessments for demand flexibility; and outlines actions that state and local governments can take, in concert with utilities, regional grid operators, and building owners, to advance demand flexibility.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗

DOE OSTI2023

Maximum-impact Adversary Design for Network-based Control System: A Case Study on Grid-interactive Efficient Buildings

The Internet of Things (IoT) technology has dramatically improved the efficiency of today's building operation and management. By connecting controllable devices into a communication network, control signals can be easily passed to the devices, and operating status can be acquired from measurable ends with minimal effort. However, this all-connected configuration could also expose the network-based control system (NBCS) to malicious actions, such as cyberattacks. One of the common NBCSs is the building automation system. With the promotion of grid-interactive efficient buildings (GEBs), there has been increasing attention on securing the buildings from the network perspective. This research proposes a maximum-impact adversary design framework so that the adversary can provide the most adversarial impact on the controlled system while remaining stealthy. The proposed framework is numerically demonstrated on a network-based building energy and control system. The building energy system is built in a Modelica-based simulation environment and controlled by the state-of-the-art ASHRAE Guideline 36 control sequences. The control commands at the supervisory level, generated from the Guideline 36 controller, are assumed to be sent to local devices through communication networks using the BACnet protocol. Simulation results show that the proposed maximum-impact adversary on such a system can stealthily affect the building system's performance to its maximum extent. It is anticipated that results can be used by researchers and practitioners in the building automation industry to design efficient and robust cyber-attack detection algorithms, especially for stealthy attacks.

Chu, Mengyuan↗