Improving Building Energy Simulation Programs Through Diagnostic Testing (Fact Sheet)
New test procedure evaluates quality and accuracy of energy analysis tools for the residential building retrofit market.
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New test procedure evaluates quality and accuracy of energy analysis tools for the residential building retrofit market.
This technical highlight describes NREL research to develop Building Energy Simulation Test for Existing Homes (BESTEST-EX) to increase the quality and accuracy of energy analysis tools for the building retrofit market.
This simulation study adapts and applies the general framework described in BESTEST-EX (Judkoff et al 2010) for self-testing residential building energy model calibration methods. BEopt/DOE-2.2 is used to evaluate four mathematical calibration methods in the context of monthly, daily, and hourly synthetic utility data for a 1960's-era existing home in a cooling-dominated climate. The home's model inputs are assigned probability distributions representing uncertainty ranges, random selections are made from the uncertainty ranges to define 'explicit' input values, and synthetic utility billing data are generated using the explicit input values. The four calibration methods evaluated in this study are: an ASHRAE 1051-RP-based approach (Reddy and Maor 2006), a simplified simulated annealing optimization approach, a regression metamodeling optimization approach, and a simple output ratio calibration approach. The calibration methods are evaluated for monthly, daily, and hourly cases; various retrofit measures are applied to the calibrated models and the methods are evaluated based on the accuracy of predicted savings, computational cost, repeatability, automation, and ease of implementation.
This simulation study adapts and applies the general framework described in BESTEST-EX (Judkoff et al 2010) for self-testing residential building energy model calibration methods. BEopt/DOE-2.2 is used to evaluate four mathematical calibration methods in the context of monthly, daily, and hourly synthetic utility data for a 1960's-era existing home in a cooling-dominated climate. The home's model inputs are assigned probability distributions representing uncertainty ranges, random selections are made from the uncertainty ranges to define "explicit" input values, and synthetic utility billing data are generated using the explicit input values. The four calibration methods evaluated in this study are: an ASHRAE 1051-RP-based approach (Reddy and Maor 2006), a simplified simulated annealing optimization approach, a regression metamodeling optimization approach, and a simple output ratio calibration approach. The calibration methods are evaluated for monthly, daily, and hourly cases; various retrofit measures are applied to the calibrated models and the methods are evaluated based on the accuracy of predicted savings, computational cost, repeatability, automation, and ease of implementation.