Identification of Environmental and Contextual Driving Factors of Air Conditioning Usage Behaviour in the Sydney Residential Buildings

Air conditioning (A/C) is generally responsible for a significant proportion of total building energy consumption. However, occupants’ air conditioning usage patterns are often unrealistically characterised in building energy performance simulation tools, which leads to a gap between simulated and a...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Bongchan Jeong, Jungsoo Kim, Zhenjun Ma, Paul Cooper, Richard de Dear
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2021-03-01
Series:Buildings
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2075-5309/11/3/122
Description
Summary:Air conditioning (A/C) is generally responsible for a significant proportion of total building energy consumption. However, occupants’ air conditioning usage patterns are often unrealistically characterised in building energy performance simulation tools, which leads to a gap between simulated and actual energy use. The objective of this study was to develop a stochastic model for predicting occupant behaviour relating to A/C cooling and heating in residential buildings located in the Subtropical Sydney region of Australia. Multivariate logistic regression was used to estimate the probability of using A/C in living rooms and bedrooms, based on a range of physical environmental (outdoor and indoor) and contextual (season, day of week, and time of day) factors observed in 42 Sydney region houses across a two-year monitoring period. The resulting models can be implemented in building energy performance simulation (BEPS) tools to more accurately predict indoor environmental conditions and energy consumption attributable to A/C operation.
ISSN:2075-5309