Abstract:

The variety of ventilation requirements, thermal comfort specifications, and lower cooling loads for highperformance buildings can motivate the use of multiple HVAC systems whose dynamic interactions can strongly affect performance. We develop a Modelica energy model of a multi-zone residential building, based on an prototype EnergyPlus model distributed by the U.S. DOE, to quantify these interactions and design new controls to improve comfort. Fully dynamic radiant, convective, and ventilation subsystems are all integrated into a heterogeneous cooling system that has better performance than is achievable by a smaller collection of systems.