Integrated control of radiant floor heating systems in residential buildings

Abstract

The ‘ideal’ optimal control of a radiant floor heating system (RFHS) can be achieved when a central controller is fully aware of the interrelationship between the different thermal dynamics of a boiler, radiant floor, and room. This study proposed integrated control strategies that can consider the interaction of heterogeneous RFHSs using a minimalistic approach with minimal data easily available from residential buildings. Three individual artificial neural networks were developed to choreograph the heterogeneous dynamics of the RFHSs for each household. Then, model predictive control was applied to realize the real-time integrated control of the RFHSs in the residential buildings. Approximately 14–46% of heating energy could be saved by integrated control. Moreover, the potential energy saving rate from integrated control varied depending on the degree of human intervention.

KEYWORDS:

• Integrated control
• radiant floor heating system
• MPC
• residential
• human intervention

Acknowledgment

This work was supported by the Korea Institute of Energy Technology Evaluation and Planning(KETEP) and the Ministry of Trade, Industry & Energy(MOTIE) of the Republic of Korea (No. 20192010107290).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

Due to the nature of the research, due to [ethical/legal/commercial] supporting data is not available.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Korea Institute of Energy Technology Evaluation and Planning: [Grant Number 20192010107290].