A rapid calibration procedure and case study for simplified simulation models of commonly used HVAC systems

A rapid procedure for calibrating simplified building energy simulation models of commonly used HVAC systems has been developed. The procedure developed will allow building professionals to project annual cooling and heating energy consumption of buildings with multiple HVAC systems from short-term field measurement data. This paper describes the general calibration procedure developed, and demonstrates the use of the calibration procedure by applying it to an office building. The calibration methodology requires as little as two weeks of measured hourly heating and cooling consumption data. In the example presented, the simulation model was calibrated using only two weeks of measured heating and cooling data. After calibrating the simulation using this procedure, the RMSE is reduced significantly. The simulation calibrated to two weeks of measured data is then used to simulate the hourly consumption of the building for the year 2004. Comparison of the results of this simulation with the measured data gave monthly CV(RMSE) values of 10.3% and 3.7% for cooling and heating, respectively, which are both well below the 15% values considered acceptable in ASHRAE Guideline 14 [1]. It also shows monthly NMBE values of 2.2% and 1.4% for cooling and heating respectively.