The influence of occupants behaviour in a high performing building.

Valentina Fabi1, Simona DOca1 , Tiziana Buso1 and Stefano Corgnati2

1
Politecnico di Torino, Italy

Corresponding email: stefano.corgnati@polito.it

SUMMARY

Green buildings are now at the forefront of building research and climate change mitigation
scenarios. The successful delivery of green buildings requires balancing energy and resource
efficiency while providing a comfortable and healthy environment. Since the success of a
high-performance building (HPB) depends on how it is designed, built, and managed,
occupant comfort and behaviour can have a significant impact on the green building
performance. Individual occupants and the choices they make (opening and closing windows,
turning up and down the thermostats, etc.) directly affect the amount of energy used in every
type of building. This paper focuses on the possible profiles of occupant behavior and their
resulting effects on energy consumption in a high performing building. Stochastic profiles of
window opening and indoor temperature preferences were implemented in a dynamic
building energy simulation tool. The study mainly addresses at the evaluation of the impact of
probabilistic occupants profiles on energy consumption in HPB comparing the obtained
results with a regular deterministic use of the building energy simulation tool.

INTRODUCTION

High-performance buildings are designed to save water and energy, reduce waste, improve air
quality, and increase occupant health and productivity. They represent a holistic approach to
building design that considers all aspects of the built environment as part of a system. High
performance buildings maximize operational energy savings; improve comfort, health, and
safety of occupants and visitors; and limit detrimental effects on the environment. Starting
with a series of energy- and resource-efficient projects that are reaping meaningful energy and
cost savings along with important associated benefits, buildings like the Federal Courthouse
in Denver, a new U.S. Environmental Protection Agency facility in North Carolina, or the
Natural Resources Defense Council in New York City, boast numerous value-added features
known as green, sustainable, make them high performance. From project outset, these
building owners, designers, and contractors actively committed to maximizing operational
energy savings, providing healthy interiors, and limiting the detrimental environmental
impacts of the buildings construction and operation. As a consequence, they have also
leveraged some compelling side benefits. The building occupants enjoy an improved sense of
health and well-being that can be attributed to improved daylighting, quality high-efficiency
lighting, and better indoor air. Some of these building owners have reported tangible increases
in worker productivity. The most important parts of that system are the building occupants.
Without occupants' support of a building's high-performance attributes, even the most well
designed building can fail to measure up to its high-performance potential. Research shows
that if occupants don't act in a way that supports design intent, performance standards can be
compromised.
Although occupants are critical to the success of a high-performing building, they are often
the missing piece of the sustainability puzzle because of the complexity in addressing human
behaviour. Building simulation tools are based on heat transfer and thermodynamic equations,
and typically model human actions (operation of lights, blinds and windows) basing on
predefined fixed schedules or predefined rules (the window always open if the indoor
temperature exceeds a certain limit). These tools often reproduce building dynamics using
numerical approximations of equations modelling only deterministic (fully predictable and
repeatable) behaviours. Models of human behaviour are on the other hand based on statistical
algorithms that predict the probability of an action or event. For example, to face this topic,
different assumptions to model the occupants window-opening behaviour are made in
literature: assumptions are the defined schedule window opening based on occupancy or the
expectation that window opening to be controlled by temperatures, humidity, wind, rain or to
produce an established airflow rate, supposing the occupants use the windows to achieve the
design ventilation rates [1]. These assumptions do not necessarily represent the occupants
actual behaviour and for this reason, it is necessary to use algorithms for users interactions
with the building control systems based on field investigations in real buildings. This paper
focuses on the a probabilistic simulation of occupant behavior and their resulting effects on
energy consumption in a high performing building. Stochastic profiles of window opening
and indoor temperature preferences were implemented in a dynamic building energy
simulation tool for the assessment of the impact of probabilistic occupants profiles on energy
consumption in HPB. The evaluation is carried on by comparing the obtained results of the
probabilistic occupant profiles with a regular deterministic use of the building energy
simulation tool.

METHODS

A way to consider the importance of occupant behaviour in the energy simulations is explored
in this work. A probabilistic approach is adopted in the simulations in order to investigate
how probabilistic user patterns influence energy consumptions of a high performing building,
improving accuracy of calculated energy performance in buildings simulation tools. The goal
is to determinate how occupant behavioural patterns describing user interaction with the
controls and in particular with windows affect the building energy performance prediction.
A high performing building has been chosen as case study for the evaluation of energy
performances: it has been simulated as deterministic first in order to compare the results once
the probabilistic profiles has been implemented in the building energy simulation software as
well. Based on a previous monitoring in 15 Danish dwellings [2] in Copenhagen, Denmark, a
database was elaborated in order to get all the required information of occupants interactions
with controls (windows and thermostatic radiator valves). Through the statistical software R it
was possible to determinate the most window opening behavior and temperature set-point
preferences influencing factors within indoor climate variables and outdoor weather
conditions. Occupant profiles were assessed on the base of the frequency of the interactions
with controls, and named as active, medium or passive users. The probability of opening or
closing the windows and turning up and down the heating set-point was interfered by
logistical regression. Three different user behavioural patterns according to window opening
and closing behavior and three other different user behavioural patterns according to the
heating set-point changes were defined. They have been implemented in IDA ICE (Indoor
Climate and Energy) [3] was used and the equation describing the probability of user
interacting with the control of the indoor environmental quality. The event taking place is
integrated in the program. To be able to compare energy calculations results, simulations were
conducted maintaining constant: location, building construction and thermal zone heating
settings. Moreover a probabilistic distribution, instead that a single value, was preferred as a
representation of energy consumptions. To do this, distribution curves were calculated with
the use of twenty different lists of random numbers to associate to both the probability of
opening and closing the windows. Beside energy consumptions, also indoor climate quality of
the built environment needs to be taken into account and air change rates represented.
Probabilistic distributions of ventilation losses are evaluated for different user types.

A PROBABILISTIC APPROACH

To estimate the effect of the control on windows and thermostatic radiator valves by different
user behavioural patterns, the probability equations determined in R were implemented in the
dynamic building simulation software IDA ICE (IDA ICE Version 4.0 build 0).

The probabilistic model

In order to assess the influence of occupant behavior on building energy performances, this
work uses the results of a field monitoring campaign in Danish dwelling (Andersen et al.,
2011), containing both indoor and outdoor environmental variables and occupants control
interactions. In this study the results of statistical data analysis carried on in other studies [4;
5] are applied as probabilistic input for the building energy simulations. Window opening and
closing and set-point dependency on indoor and outdoor environment were deduced by means
of logistic regression with interaction between variables accordingly to the following
equation:

= a + b1 x1 + b2 x2 + + bn xn + c12 x1x2 + c13 x1x3 + (1)

A model that predicts the degree of opening and the size of the set-point change was inferred
using linear regression. The results provide the possibility of defining behavioural models of
window and radiator thermostatic valves use to be implemented in simulation tool for energy
simulations.

Simulations

The aim of this study is to switch from a deterministic approach of building energy simulation
toward a probabilistic one that takes into account the occupants presence and interactions with
the building and systems. In particular the attention focuses on the interaction between users
and window opening behavior and set-point preferences. Results of the statistical analysis
provide the possibility of defining behavioural models to be implemented in simulation tool
for energy simulations.

The reference building: The Solaire

In order to investigate the effect of occupants behaviours both on energy consumption and
indoor climate quality simulations were ran firstly in a residential high performing building:
first it was simulated to evaluate the building energy performance in using schedules and set-
points predefined (deterministic reference building).
The chose case study is named The Solaire (figure 1, left). The Solaire at 20 River Terrace
is a 27-story, 293-unit, glass-and-brick residential tower in Battery Park City, a planned
residential and commercial neighborhood built on landfill bordering the west side of New
York City's financial district and directly adjacent to the site of the former World Trade
Center. It is the first building designed in accordance with new environmental guidelines
instituted in 2000 by the Battery Park City Authority (BPCA), the government entity that has
overseen the development of Battery Park City since 1969.

Figure 1. The Solaire building in New York (left) and the simulated thermal zone (right).

The Solaire was designed to consume 35% less energy, reduce peak demand for electricity by
65%, and require 50% less potable water than a conventional, residential high-rise building.
An integrated array of photovoltaic panels generates 5% of the building's energy at peak
loading. The building incorporates an advanced HVAC system, fueled by natural gas and free
of ozone-depleting refrigerants. Multi-level humidification and ventilation systems supply
filtered fresh air to each residential unit. Daylighting was maximized and balanced with the
thermal envelope. High-performance casement windows were used throughout. An on-site
black water treatment and reuse system supplies the cooling tower and the building's toilets
with water. More details on the case study could be found in [6].
In order to investigate the effect of occupants behaviours both on energy consumption and
indoor climate quality simulations were ran firstly in a typical dwelling of the residential
building (figure 1, right). The dwelling area is 85m2, consisting of a bedroom, a living room
and a kitchen. The external wall is facing west, the window area is 4.6 m2 both in the
bedroom and in the living room. The thermo physical properties of the opaque components
are resumed in Errore. L'origine riferimento non stata trovata.. The transparent
component has argon fill and its solar and thermal characteristics are: U value: 2.5 W/(m2K);
solar transmittance, T= 0.376; SHGH, g= 0.72.

Table 1. Thermophysical properties of the opaque components

U-value Thickness Thermal conductivity Density Specific heat capacity
Material
(W/m2) (cm) (W/(m K)) (kg/m3) (J/(kgK))
Gypsum plaster 2 1 1200 900
Waterproof barrier 0.2 0.2 20 1000
Mineral wool 10 0.06 20 1030
External wall 0.6
Concrete 15 2 550 105
Gap 1 1 1 1000
Brick 12 1 1800 840
 Gypsum plaster 0.02 1 1200 900
Internal wall Brick 1.8 0.12 0.036 1200 100
Gypsum plaster 0.02 1 1200 900

Paving material 2 0.22

850 2400
Light concrete 4 1.83
2000 1000
Internal ceiling Mineral wool 0.38 8.5 0.06
20 1030
Concrete 31 0.13
600 1000
Gypsum plaster 2 1
1200 900
Plastic covering 18 0.13 680 1700
Concrete 5 1.83 2000 1000
Mineral wool 12 0.06 20 1030
External floor Waterproof barrier 0.25 0.2 0.2 20 1000
Concrete 25 1 550 105
Mineral wool 6 0.04 150 1030
Gypsum plaster 0.2 1 900 900

As internal heat gain, one person was considered always present at an activity level of
70W/m2 (metabolic activity of 1.2 met). The lighting schedule is connected to the people
presence. Furthermore, the light in the room, with an emitted 50W per unit, is automatically
switching on if the minimum work plane illuminance is lower than 100 Lux based on the
study of the Lightswitch-2002 (Reinhart, 2004); the light, is automatically switched off at an
illuminance level of 500 Lux. The location used for the simulation is New York USA and the
meteorological data refers to the New York Meteorological Whether Station.

RESULTS

The deterministic approach

At first, the aim was to calibrate the thermal zone in order to obtain the energy consumption
provided by the designers case study in terms of energy for heating, cooling, electricity and
water for domestic usage. Starting from the Battery Park Guide Line and the ASHRAE 62.2
standard indications the following factors were changed: indoor temperature (from 20C-24C
to 22C-25C), air flow (from 0.35-7 L/sm to 1.5 - 7 L/sm), relative humidity (from 30%-
50% to 20%-40%) and boiler efficiency (from 0.8 to 0.6).
These simulations are ran in the deterministic standard way that is the common in nowadays
approaches. In doing so, evidently, results are calculated on the base of schedules assumptions
decided a priori that describe occupancy presence, lighting or equipment: the obtained results
of these deterministic simulations are given in Table 1:

Table 1. Energy consumption for space heating, cooling, lighting and domestic hot water
usage for the simulated thermal zone
Heating Cooling Lighting DHW
(kWh/m2) (kWh/m2) (kWh/m2) (kWh/m2)
Calibrated thermal zone 193 64 15 28

The probabilistic approach

A probabilistic approach is adopted to investigate how probabilistic user patterns influence
indoor environmental quality and energy consumptions improving accuracy of calculated
energy performance in buildings simulation tools. The goal is to determinate user behavioural
pattern that describes user interaction with the controls and in particular with window opening
and thermostatic radiator valves. In the occupancy schedule the occupant is considered as
always present but window and heating control is probabilistic in nature, it doesnt follow
maximum and/or minimum set-point controller. The probability of interacting with windows
and adjusting the temperature set-point was calculated based on the logistic regression
previously described. Specifically, three behavioural patterns were simulated (Active,
Medium and Passive users both for windows use and thermostat set-point adjustment for a
total of 9 implemented models). IDA Indoor Climate and Energy, as most simulation
programs, is deterministic in nature. Therefore there is a need to translate the probability of an
occurring event in a deterministic signal. A way to solve this problem is to compare the given
probability to a random number to determine if the event takes place or not. [7;8]As the given
probability is the probability of opening the window and switching up/down the thermostatic
radiator valves in the next ten minutes, the comparison was made with a random number that
change every ten minutes.

Simulation results
Switching from the deterministic simulation to a probabilistic approach, high variation in
energy consumption could be highlighted. In particular, three probabilistic scenarios has been
simulated, to evaluate the influence of probabilistic window opening and probabilistic
thermostat set-point adjustment separately before to implement both the probabilistic controls
in IDA ICE. The main results are here presented.

Influence of window opening and closing

At first, only the probabilistic control on windows has been implemented, maintaining
constant the indoor temperature set point at 20C. The 3 users typologies have been
simulated 10 times and the obtained results compared to the deterministic scenario, in terms
of space heating and cooling energy demand. When using implement behavioural patterns, a
significant difference can be appreciated on energy demands for the three different cases. The
results displayed in Table 3, show a big discrepancy in heating energy demand with the active
users, reaching an increase of about 36% respect to the deterministic standard model. The gap
is less in case of space cooling energy demand, consisting of 2.2% maximum increase of
medium user typology implementation.

Table 3. Energy consumption for space heating and cooling, for the simulated users
typologies and the deterministic standard model.
User types Heating energy demand (kWh/m2) Cooling energy demand (kWh/m2)

Active 300 65
Medium 198 66
Passive 209 64
Deterministic standard 193 64

Influence of set point thermostat

The second scenario is represented by the implementation of the probabilistic control of
thermostat set-point, maintaining deterministic the control on windows. The 3 users
typologies have been simulated 10 times as well and the obtained results compared with the
deterministic scenario in terms of space heating energy demand, as well.
Energy consumption doesnt linearly increase accordingly to occupants frequency of
interaction with set-point controller (Errore. L'origine riferimento non stata trovata.).
The figure shows the trend of the 10 probabilistic simulation: the maximum variation respect
to the standard detrministic model is about 6% with passive users. An high discrepancy has
been obtained in terms of interaction with thermostat set-point: the active users change it
more frequently and it results in a wide temperatures range (from 19C to 26C), while the
medium and passive user types interact less frequently (and the temperature ranges is from
20C to 21C) (Figure 3).

Figure 2. The simulated thermal zone.

Figure 3. The simulated heating set-point preferences.

Influence of window opening/closing and set point thermostat

In the third scenario, the control both on window and on thermostat are implemented. 9
different users model were implemented, according to occupant behavioural patterns related
on windows not necessarily comply in the reality with the same thermostat behavioural
pattern profile. The results of the simulations are represented in Figure 4 in terms of
requirements for space heating and cooling. The maximum variation with the deterministic
model is about 36%, while the maximum variation between the different implemented models
is about 40% with active model for windows opening and the active model for the thermostat
control.

Figure 4. The simulated thermal zone.

In the case of space cooling energy demand, the gap between the deterministic and the
probabilistic control on windows and thermostat fall at 8%.

CONCLUSIONS

The main goal of this research was estimate the impact of user control on high performing
buildings based on a probabilistic approach. For this purpose, a simulation study on the
effects of occupant interactions with the windows and the heating control on energy demands
has been conducted in a typical dwelling of a residential high performing building by using at
first the deterministic approach used nowadays in simulation programs. Secondly, the
probability of opening and closing the windows and switching up/down the set-point
temperature on the TRV is predicted for three different users models for window opening and
three for heating set-point preferences (they are named active, medium and passive for
both the controls) and implemented in a dynamic building energy simulation software. Three
different simulation scenarios are represented, displaying a progressive augmentation in
variability. Findings demonstrated that predefined heating set-point preferences and air
change rates used as assumption in building energy simulation are far away from actual
occupants preferences in buildings. Results of the study highlight significant influences of
occupant behaviour on the building energy demands. Energy consumption in the simulated
high performing building in which occupants personal control is performed by probabilistic
functions, raised up to 36% in comparison to the high performing building where the
occupants interaction with the controls is regulated in a deterministic way by fixed schedules.
The performed study highlights how not to consider humans interactions with the building
and control systems will necessarily lead designers and modellers to an undestimation of the
building energy performances.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This study was carried out as a part of an international collaboration within the IEA ECBCS
project Annex 53. Moreover, authors wants to thank the Competence Center of Telecom Italia
in Polytechnic of Turin for fully supporting the activity.

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