Residential HVAC commissioning through energy

consumption data analysis.

INTRODUCTION
Heating, ventilation, and cooling (HVAC) systems, often the single largest residential energy
consumer, account for approximately 26-40% of all residential energy consumption (RECS 2009),
with the higher percentages in the warm climactic regions. The air conditioning systems that
service the residential building stock, including mini-split systems and heat pumps, however, are
often not well understood by home owners, and commonly function below the optimum design
intent due to sizing, operation and maintenance related issues (SCE 2012a). Residential HVAC
systems typically are not scheduled for regular maintenance or service, and are serviced only when
a major failure occurs (i.e. the unit stops working). Thus, the correction of ongoing faults that may
affect efficient operation of an air conditioning unit but not cause failure are not necessarily the
priority. Because there is little available oversight of the operation of these units, these ongoing
faults may go unnoticed for extended periods of time, consuming excess energy and expense to the
user, and reducing the service life of the unit. Surveys of packaged air conditioning units, including
split systems used in residential buildings, have shown that faults in these systems are common,
occurring in up to 70% of units (Breuker and Braun 1998, Li and Braun 2004, Rossi 2004, Proctor
2004). Correcting many of these deficiencies alone, are predicted to reduce consumption by 8
to 30% (Brambley 2009, Rhodes et al 2011). Additional savings may be realized by reducing the
labor costs needed for diagnosing and correcting failures in air conditioning systems by providing
operation information on the system just prior to its failure. Several commercially available systems
exist to provide fault detection and diagnostics (FDD) for HVAC systems, however their use is
currently cost-prohibitive for all but large commercial systems (Bramberly 2009, Wiggins and
Brodrick 2012). As efficiency efforts continue to be emphasized throughout the residential sector to
curb electric grid load growth and peak load spikes, developing low-cost ways to identify
and realize improvements to existing HVAC systems is strongly desired.
In the United States, in 2012 over 1/3 of households had smartmeter technologies installed in their
homes (IEE 2012). This numbercontinues to increase as utility companies continue to adopt
thesetechnologies to aid in the management of the U.S. electrical grids. By2015 the penetration of
smart meters is predicted to reach 50%.Currently, smart meters typically collect energy use data in
hourly or15-minute increments, with smaller increments becoming increasingly morecommon. The
installation of home energy management systems (HEMS) isalso increasing in popularity (Bojanczyk
2013). Higher frequency anddisaggregated, circuit-by-circuit data collected by HEMS provide
aninformative and telling picture of power draw and energy use in a home.Thus far the increasing
deployment of smart meters and HEMS inresidential communities has been shown to reduce
residential energyconsumption by providing feedback to consumers to encourage changes
inbehavior (summarized in Armel et al (2013)), and by enabling voluntaryutility- controlled load
shifting during peak load events. However, manyof the possible energy-saving benefits of available
energy use data inhomes remain unharnessed. The increasing deployment of these
smarttechnologies provide a great opportunity to better evaluate residentialHVAC system
performance. By providing previously inaccessibleinformation on the operations of these systems
such as power (W), energyconsumption (kWh), and cycling time and frequency, this
information,combined with indoor and outdoor temperature data, has significantpotential to provide
the information needed to detect and diagnose HVACfaults and failures. This form of continuous
commissioning of theresidential HVAC system via the monitoring of energy use data, can helpin the
effort to further reduce residential energy consumption.

To date, FDD efforts have focused on commercial systems due to their higher costs and
complexities, using two different approaches, including statistical methods and simulation based
approaches. Limited studies have been conduction on the assessment of the potential for FDD in
residential systems, including development of a testing methodology (SCE 2012a) for fault detection
of residential air conditioners, and assessing the potential of using a commercial FDD on a
residential unit (SCE 2013). This FDD system, however is highly complex, recording and analyzing
over 10 separate measurements for the use in the detection of faults. Little has been done to utilize
energy use data for FDD, particularly with residential buildings. A recent paper (Lu et al., 2012)
found high-level problems and faults in smart meter data such as data tampering, loss of meter
connection and sensor malfunctions could be detected. However, to the authors' knowledge, the
possibility of HVAC fault detection has not been exploring using energy consumption data.
With smart meter and HEMS installations continuously increasing,residential energy consumption
data and thus HVAC consumption data canbe tapped as a resource in a low-cost HVAC fault
detection anddiagnosis. While previously the initial investment cost ininfrastructure required to
monitor energy consumption may have been costprohibitive, the utilization of this already metered
data makes thepossibility for residential FDD more feasible. This coupled withdecreasing costs of
sensors make strong case for further researchefforts in this field. This study uses 1-minute energy
use data (Watts)typical of a HEMS, for a home in Austin, TX, an air conditioner model,and field
testing to demonstrate the potential of the use of residentialenergy use data for use in the detection
and diagnosis of residentialHVAC faults. The most common faults in packaged HVAC systems
include lowand high refrigerant charge, the presence of non-combustibles in therefrigerant,
refrigerant flow restrictions, and air flow rate reductionto the condenser and/or evaporator (SCE
2012b, Bramberly 2009, Wigginsand Brodrick 2012). A recent study that conducted limited testing
on oneresidential HVAC unit indicated that of these common faults, the reducedair flow to the
outdoor residential condenser/compressor units has thegreatest effect on power draw (W) of the unit
(SCE 2012b), the variablethat is monitored in high- granularity energy use data monitoring. Thismay
occur due to dirt and debris covering the exterior of the unit, andthus is the fault of focus in this
preliminary research. The effect ofother faults are being similarly studied and are a part of
ongoingresearch efforts.
METHODOLOGY
This study includes three main steps used to demonstrate the potential of FDD with energy use
data. This includes (a) demonstration of linear correlation of HVAC power draw (W) to outdoor
temperature ([degrees]F), (b) how changes in air flow to the condenser affect the system
performance, and (c) how the change in system performance resulting from this fault would be
visible in energy use data. For (a), energy use data is used with information on the HVAC system
installed in the considered home in this study. This is compared with outdoor temperatures and fit
to a linear curve. For (b), field testing was first conducted to verify the relationship between the
area of air flow restriction of the condenser and the air flow rate. A highly detailed HVAC modeling
program, ACHP (Bell 2012), is then used to create a model of the considered HVAC system from (a).
Different scenarios are modeled using the model show how changes in flow rates of the external
condenser unit impact the performance of the system. For (c), the several data points are chosen
from the model results as a representation of the possible effects that reduced air flow rate
([m.sup.3]/s), representing faults in the condenser unit, can have on the HVAC performance.
Utilized Datasets
Highly granular one-minute energy use data (W) was collected for homes in a concentrated area in
Austin, TX through efforts by the Pecan Street Research Institute. Energy consumption data was

collected using a HEMS, which includes CT (current transformer) collars that are attached to the
circuits of a home's breaker box, and an adapter that connects to the home's internet router for data
collection. The HEMS provides root-mean-square (RMS) of current and voltage to calculate average
real power and apparent power, which is saved at one-minute increments. Circuit monitoring
includes whole-home consumption data, as well as individual circuits, including the installed HVAC
system. For this study, this eliminates the need for disaggregation algorithms to isolate the HVAC
circuit from the whole-home energy use data that may introduce undesirable error in the analysis.
The HVAC circuit in each home captures the power use (W) of the combined compressor and
condenser fan. The air handler is included on a separate circuit and is not used for analysis in this
study.
A year of data (January 1--December 31, 2012) was collected for homes in Austin, TX. As this is a
preliminary study and methodology demonstration, one home is analyzed. Additional homes will be
analyzed in the future to further refine the proposed model and methodology. Two different days of
the year, May 1 and August 2 were chosen for this methodology demonstration study, May being at
the beginning of the cooling season in Austin, TX, and August typically being the hottest month
when cooling is used most. A 24-hour period of data was analyzed over these two days. Figure 1
shows the whole- home power (W) of the selected house for these two days. Large spikes are visible
in the whole-home data indicating the cycling on and off of the HVAC system. Other high power
users, including home appliances are also visible in this signal.
[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]
In addition to energy use data, for many of the houses monitored, energy audits were conducted on
each of the homes, providing detailed information on each home, including details on the homes'
installed HVAC system components. The data collection methodology is explained in detail in
Rhodes et al. (2013). Based on this dataset, the installed system at the chosen home analyzed in this
paper was identified. Datasheets on the HVAC system component, were obtained from
the manufacturers for use in the development of the ACHP model.

Correlation of Residential HVAC

System Power &
Outdoor Temperature
During the cooling period of the year, a
typical residential HVAC system,
unlike a commercial system, cycles on
and off, rather than running
continuously. The HVAC system turns
on when the thermostat indicates that
the interior temperature is greater
than that of the setpoint temperature
plus a deadband range, typically from
0.5[degrees]F to several degrees
Fahrenheit. When the condenser fan
and compressor turn on, this creates a
spike in the power (W) utilized for this system, as shown in Figure 2. This spike in power can vary
greatly depending on the size of the system in use. For the two days considered, accounts for up to

79% of the electricity consumed at any given time for this home.

Figure 2 shows the cycling of the HVAC system during one day in May and August. During the
cooler morning hours and early afternoon hours, the HVAC system cycles much less. During the
peak temperature and late afternoon hours the spikes are longer and more frequent. In terms
of energy consumption, most of the energy is consumed in the afternoon and evening period as
well, as shown in Figure 3. As seen in Figure 2, temperature of the outdoor air that enters the
intake of the compressor are highly correlated. If temperature and power are plotting over
the course of a day, power (W) has a strong relationship, much stronger than that of temperature
and hourly electricity use (kWh), which peaks in energy use several hours after peak outdoor
temperatures (Figure 3). In addition, electricity use (kWh), is dependent on external factors
beyond the HVAC system components, including thermostat set points, human activities inside the
home, opening and closing of doors and windows of the home, etc. Power, however, is a function
only of the HVAC system components and the outdoor air temperature, and is thus a
better indicator of HVAC performance.
[FIGURE 2 OMITTED]
[FIGURE 3 OMITTED]
When plotting the power (W) with temperature, the [R.sup.2] value is above 0.95 for each days,
indicating a strong fit on a single-day basis. Together (Figure 4), still a strong correlation, but
slightly lower, R value of the linear relationship is observed, with a fairly even distribution of data
points above and below the linear relationship during both days. The temperatures of these two
days combined encompass the spread of temperatures common for summer temperatures in
warm climates and thus are deems sufficient for this initial analysis. In addition, since both
measurements are taken within several months of each other and the HVAC system was only 5
years old, it is assumed that the system is operating without any fault at the same efficiency
level for both days. Variations in peak power may be, in part, a result of the not sufficient
granularity of the data. The HEMS system measures power and averages these measurement over a
minute long period, thus if the system just turned on or off, the power measurement may not
necessarily represent the exact value at that time.
Some of the variation in data can also be associated with the time of day. The data are separated
into time periods of before 4 pm and after 4 pm on each day, as shown in Figure 4, with 4 pm being
when outdoor temperatures generally begin to decrease as the sun goes down after increasing
throughout the day. If linear trend lines are fit to the data, a slightly better fit is found for the
individual days. It is also noted that there is greater variation in the power at higher temperatures
that occur in the afternoon hours than in the cooler morning hours. This is possibly due to the
human activity such as thermostat setpoint change, more frequent on and off cycling in

the afternoon hours and thus greater stress on the HVAC system during peak hours, or other
factors. Regardless of slight variations, however, the power of the HVAC generally shows a strong
relationship to outdoor temperature. This relationship of outdoor temperature and power (W)
can be considered the baseline, no-fault functioning of the system. If over time, the power draw
begins to vary significantly from this trend line, it is possible a fault has occurred in the system.
Additional factors such as cycling duration and frequency and electricity use (kWh) could also be
considered.
[FIGURE 4 OMITTED]
Direct Expansion HVAC System Model
With an understanding of the performance of the home's HVAC system, coupling this with system
characteristics provided by the home energy audit conducted on this home, a DX HVAC system
model called ACHP (Bell 2012) is fit to the characteristics and performance of this HVAC system.
ACHP is a direct expansion cycle model that is designed to model direct expansion (DX) systems.
Using input parameters available from the manufacturer's published data, and fitting parameters,
the model is fit to the current HVAC system performance. A graph of the field-collected energy use
data and model data is shown in Figure 5, which shows a good fit of the model to the data.
[FIGURE 5 OMITTED]
Predicted Effects of Condenser Fault on HVAC System
If the outdoor condenser unit is clogged or dirty, this can decrease the flow rate of the condenser
since less air can flow through the condenser coils. To show how a fault due to the condenser
fouling in the external AC unit reduces the flow rate, a residential HVAC system that services a
manufactured test home, the UTest House at the University of Texas at Austin, was used to mimic
actual conditions of a residential home in Austin, TX. The HVAC system used in field testing was
not the same unit installed in the studied home, however the trends are anticipated to be similar
and are used as a proof of concept and methodology. The air flow into the condenser ([m.sup.3]/s)
was varied, mimicking condenser fouling by adhering an impermeable barrier on 0, 1, 2, and 3
sides of the compressor. Two sets of field measurements were made, including static air pressure
and flow rate to develop a fan curve (Figure 7). A flow hood was installed on top of the condenser
unit to measure air flow. This confirms that condenser fouling reduces the flow rate, and also
demonstrates that the reduction in flow rate increase non-linearly with increasing area of the
condenser intake blocked.
With a decreased flow rate, the power increases since the condenser must work harder to provide
cooling for the HVAC system. Using the HVAC model fit to the house considered in this paper, the
volumetric flow rate is varied between 20% (0.347 [m.sup.3]/s) and 110% (1.907 [m.sup.3]/s) of the
manufactured specified flow rate (1.734 [m.sup.3]/s) for temperatures between 70 F and 115 F.
These temperatures were chosen based on common temperatures that occur during the cooling
season in hot regions of the United States, specifically Austin, TX.
[FIGURE 6 OMITTED]
As shown in Figure 7 a, the power (W) varies non-linearly with volumetric flow rate. As the
volumetric flow rate decreases, the power increases. The changes in volumetric flow rate have less
effect on power at higher flow rates closer to the nominal flow rate than at lower flow rates
(approximately below 1 [m.sup.3]/s). It is also noted the power increases with increasing

temperature, which is expected due to the increased power required to cool the hot air to create
cooling power. Figure 7b shows the effect of the volumetric flow rate on the coefficient of
performance (COP) of the modeled HVAC system. Result show that, as the volumetric flow rate
decreases below the optimum flow rate, the COP of the system also decreases. This is expected
since the system would run less efficiently with a reduced or blocked flow. The COP also decreases
with increasing outdoor temperatures. This is also expected since the system will function at a
greater efficiency at lower temperatures.
[FIGURE 7 OMITTED]
Using Energy Use Data to Demonstrate HVAC Faults

As an example of the effect that a reduction in volumetric flow rate would have on the performance
of the HVAC system, we take a point at 95[degrees]F outdoor temperature on August, 2 2012 at
1:52 pm. The HVAC system is on at a power of 3230 W, which equates to, according to the ACHP
model, a volumetric flow rate of approximately 1.2 [m.sup.3]/s, and a COP of 3.4. Changing the flow
rate at these same environmental conditions of 95 F outdoor temperature, to half its original value
(0.6 [m.sup.3]/s), the power increases to approximately 3950 W and the COP decrease to
approximately 2.5. This is a 25% increase in power and 25% decrease in COP. As a second example,
we take a point at 4:39 am with a power of 2500 W and an outdoor temperature of 74 F. At these
conditions the flow rate is 1.9 [m.sup.3]/s. If this flow rate is cut in half, to 0.96 [m.sup.3]/s, this
increases the power to approximately 2820 W (13%) and decreases the COP to 4.8 from 5.7 (16%).
Using these two examples indicates that that there is a non-linear relationship between the changes
in volumetric flow rate, and COP and power.
For full integration of fault detection due to the condenser fouling in various houses and HVAC
systems, development of an empirical relationship is needed to provide a function that can predict
the signature of a reduced flow rate on the power that is detectible in energy
https://www.championac.com/ use data. However the results of this study demonstrate that changes
in flow rate can predictably affect power (W) drawn for the HVAC system. When monitoring energy
use data of an HVAC system over time, if a baseline no-fault power draw (W) values are recorded for
an HVAC system at different temperatures similar to those measurements graphed in Figure 4,
these could be compared to present power draw values. If there are significant differences in
power, this may merit inspecting and servicing of the AC unit.
Using these relationships, the cost savings and return on investment (ROI) associated with the
detection and correction of such an ongoing fault through the use of monitoring energy use data can
also be determined. However, this cost saving will depend on the system, the fault, and the climate
conditions of its location, and will thus be address in future research.
CONCLUSIONS
The above research has identified a way to detect possible reductions in performance of an HVAC
system due to the condenser fouling through changes in the power draw collected through the
continuous monitoring of energy use data. The field testing of a similar system confirmed the
performance of the system will vary non-linearly with changes in flow rate through the condenser.
The intensity of the change in power (W) is sufficiently large to be detectable by a fault
detection signal based on monitoring electric power and outdoor temperature. Additional testing
and analysis will be conducted to further develop the relationship for different residential systems,

with the goal of developing a model and an algorithm that can be implemented for residential
building systems to identify possible faults in the condenser units. Alerting the homeowner to the
occurrence of a fault could be accomplished through direct notification, similar to air filter change
alerts currently available for electronic thermostats, or through a utility or third
www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtKPS5FXsWk party that would remotely monitor the system for faults.
Defining which methodology would work best for this continuous commissioning of an HVAC system
is the subject of ongoing research.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The funding for this research is provided in part by the National Science Foundation through the
IGERT Sustainable Grid Integration of Distributed and Renewable Resources, and by the ASHRAE
Graduate Student Grant-in-Aid Award.
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Kristen Cetin
Student Member ASHRAE

Atila Novoselac, PhD

Member ASHRAE
Kristen Cetin is a PhD student in the Department of Civil, Architectural, and Environmental
Engineering at the University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX. Atila Novoselac is an associate
professor in the Department of Civil, Architectural, and Environmental Engineering at
the University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX.