Heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) systems are widely distributed over the world due to their capacity to adjust some local climate parameters, like temperature, relative humidity, cleanliness and distribution of the air until the desired levels verified in a hypothetical ideal climate. A review of buildings’ energy usage in developed countries shows that in the present this energy service is responsible for a portion of about 20% of the final energy usage on them, increasing up to 50% in hot-humid countries. In order to decrease this value, more and more different heat recovery systems have been developed and implemented over the last decades. Nowadays it is mandatory to install one of these units when the design conditions are above the limit values to avoid such components, what is possible to verify mostly in non-residential buildings. Each one of those units has its own performance and working characteristics that turns it more indicated to make part of a certain ventilation system in particular. Air-to-air energy recovery ventilation is based on the heat recovery transfer (latent and/or sensible) from the flow at high temperature to the flow at lower temperature, pre-warming the outdoor supply air (in the case of the winter). Therefore, it is important to understand in which concept those units have to be used and more important than that, how they work, helping to visualize their final effect on the HVAC system. The major aims of this study were to investigate the actual performance of the heat recovery units for LB20 and LB21 in building 99 at the University of Gävle and make some suggestions that could enhance their actual efficiency. Furthermore, the energy transfer rates associated to the heat recovery units were calculated in order to understand the impact of such components in the overall HVAC system as also the possible financial opportunity by making small improvements in the same units. To assess the system, values of temperature and flow (among others) were collected in the air stream and in the ethylene-glycol solution that works as heat transfer medium between air streams and is  enclosed in pipes that make part of the actual run-around heat recovery units. After some calculations, it was obtained that for the coldest day of measurements, the sensible effectiveness was 42% in LB20 and 47% in LB21, changing to 44% and 43% in the warmer day, respectively. The actual heat transfer representing the savings in the supply air stream is higher on the coldest day, with values of 46 kW in LB20 and 84 kW in LB21, justifying the existence of the heat recovery units even if those ones imply the use of hydraulic pumps to ensure the loop. The low values of efficiency have shown that both heat recovery units are working below the desired performance similarly to the pumps that make part of the same units.  This fact, together with the degradation of the units that is possible to observe in the local, indicates that a complete cleaning (followed by a change of the heat transfer medium) of the heat recovery units and a new adjustment of pumps and valves for the further changes, are necessary. By doing this, it is expected to see the year average sensible effectiveness increase to close to 45% in both units which will lead to a potential economic saving of around 41 000 SEK per year.

Peak electricity demand in South Africa will exceed the available operational generation capacity in 2007. The state utility Eskom is addressing this challenge, inter aha, with the implementation of the Demand-side Management (DSM) initiative. The aim of DSM is to defer the building of additional power stations by modifying the end-user pattern to reduce electrical load during the morning and evening peaks. At the end of 2005 the DSM programme has only achieved 30°/o of its target. Some of the biggest problems are the lack of knowledge on how to perform ESCO audits and availability of tools and procedures to enable Energy Service Companies (ESCOs) to evaluate DSM potential. Studies in South Africa have shown that 20°/o of the total municipal energy is utilised in commercial buildings. Additional investigations have shown that in the commercial sector approximately 50% of energy is used for air conditioning. Energy savings of around 30% can be realised through improved management procedures and retrofit projects of HVAC systems of existing buildings. Telecommunication companies own and operate a large portfolio of diverse buildings. It was shown that these buildings are very inefficient in terms of energy usage. Performing ESCO analyses on these building portfolios present huge savings opportunities for the building owners as well as load reduction opportunities to help meet DSM targets. ESCOs however face major problems in evaluating DSM projects on telecommunication facilities. Some of these problems are: time to perform the ESCO audits on such a large portfolio of buildings; skill levels of available personnel; lack of experience and structured audit process; availability of information; data capturing of information; determining the impact of the retrofits and calculating the savings and financial benefits of retrofits. Obtaining approval for DSM projects is also a lengthy process. Smaller ESCOs cannot afford to commit resources to ESCO investigations only to recover their investment after project approval. Having an ESCO procedure that will speed up the audit process will help the ESCO to minimise resources that need to be committed to these investigations. Having a tested and reliable ESCO procedure will also help Eskom since they will receive more and better quality DSM proposals. A new ESCO procedure for telecommunications facilities was developed. The primary requirements for the new ESCO procedure are that it should be simple, stable, fast and accurate. This procedure is evaluated against the known energy management opportunities in telecommunication facilities. Some of the benefits of the new ESCO procedure are: time taken to perform ESCO analysis on all types of buildings is drastically reduced; lower qualified personnel can be used to perform the ESCO analysis; any type of HVAC system configuration can be accommodated; new data capturing procedures ensure that only essential data is captured; integrated simulation software is used that can easy and accurately simulate the building operations and retrofits on a building; retrofit options suitable for telecommunication facilities are identified; contribution to the DSM programme is evaluated; financial evaluation of the retrofits and feasibility for DSM funding and results are integrated into a standardised reporting format. The new ESCO procedure was implemented on several case studies within the telecommunication infrastructure. Five different types of buildings were selected to implement the ESCO procedure. Each step of the procedure was evaluated and tested against the requirements of the new ESCO procedure. It was proven through implementation that the new ESCO procedure is successful in solving the unique problems in performing ESCO analyses for telecommunications facilities. Valuable insight into the problems that can occur during the ESCO process was highlighted, and recommendation for future work was presented. / Thesis (Ph.D. (Electrical Engineering))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2006.

Thesis (Ph.D. (Electrical Engineering))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2006.

Peak electricity demand in South Africa will exceed the available operational generation capacity in 2007. The state utility Eskom is addressing this challenge, inter aha, with the implementation of the Demand-side Management (DSM) initiative. The aim of DSM is to defer the building of additional power stations by modifying the end-user pattern to reduce electrical load during the morning and evening peaks. At the end of 2005 the DSM programme has only achieved 30°/o of its target. Some of the biggest problems are the lack of knowledge on how to perform ESCO audits and availability of tools and procedures to enable Energy Service Companies (ESCOs) to evaluate DSM potential. Studies in South Africa have shown that 20°/o of the total municipal energy is utilised in commercial buildings. Additional investigations have shown that in the commercial sector approximately 50% of energy is used for air conditioning. Energy savings of around 30% can be realised through improved management procedures and retrofit projects of HVAC systems of existing buildings. Telecommunication companies own and operate a large portfolio of diverse buildings. It was shown that these buildings are very inefficient in terms of energy usage. Performing ESCO analyses on these building portfolios present huge savings opportunities for the building owners as well as load reduction opportunities to help meet DSM targets. ESCOs however face major problems in evaluating DSM projects on telecommunication facilities. Some of these problems are: time to perform the ESCO audits on such a large portfolio of buildings; skill levels of available personnel; lack of experience and structured audit process; availability of information; data capturing of information; determining the impact of the retrofits and calculating the savings and financial benefits of retrofits. Obtaining approval for DSM projects is also a lengthy process. Smaller ESCOs cannot afford to commit resources to ESCO investigations only to recover their investment after project approval. Having an ESCO procedure that will speed up the audit process will help the ESCO to minimise resources that need to be committed to these investigations. Having a tested and reliable ESCO procedure will also help Eskom since they will receive more and better quality DSM proposals. A new ESCO procedure for telecommunications facilities was developed. The primary requirements for the new ESCO procedure are that it should be simple, stable, fast and accurate. This procedure is evaluated against the known energy management opportunities in telecommunication facilities. Some of the benefits of the new ESCO procedure are: time taken to perform ESCO analysis on all types of buildings is drastically reduced; lower qualified personnel can be used to perform the ESCO analysis; any type of HVAC system configuration can be accommodated; new data capturing procedures ensure that only essential data is captured; integrated simulation software is used that can easy and accurately simulate the building operations and retrofits on a building; retrofit options suitable for telecommunication facilities are identified; contribution to the DSM programme is evaluated; financial evaluation of the retrofits and feasibility for DSM funding and results are integrated into a standardised reporting format. The new ESCO procedure was implemented on several case studies within the telecommunication infrastructure. Five different types of buildings were selected to implement the ESCO procedure. Each step of the procedure was evaluated and tested against the requirements of the new ESCO procedure. It was proven through implementation that the new ESCO procedure is successful in solving the unique problems in performing ESCO analyses for telecommunications facilities. Valuable insight into the problems that can occur during the ESCO process was highlighted, and recommendation for future work was presented. / Thesis (Ph.D. (Electrical Engineering))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2006.

This thesis considers the development of a Hammerstein-bilinear approach to non-linear systems modelling, analysis and control systems design, which builds on and extends the applicability of an existing bilinear approach. The underlying idea of the Hammerstein-bilinear approach is to use the Hammerstein-bilinear system models to capture various physical phenomena of interest and subsequently use these for model based control system designs with the premise being that of achieving enhanced control performance. The advantage of the Hammerstein-bilinear approach is that the well-structured system models allow techniques that have been originally developed for linear systems to be extended and applied, while retaining moderate complexity of the corresponding system identification schemes and nonlinear model based control designs. In recognition of the need to be able to identify the Hammerstein-bilinear models a unified suite of algorithms, being the extensions to the simplified refined instrumental variable method for parameter estimation of linear transfer function models is proposed. These algorithms are able to operate in both the continuous-time and discrete-time domains to reflect the requirements of the intended purposes of the identified models with the emphasis being placed on straightforward applicability of the developed algorithms and recognising the need to be able to operate under realistic practical system identification scenarios. Moreover, the proposed algorithms are also applicable to parameter estimation of Hammerstein and bilinear models, which are special cases of the wider Hammerstein-bilinear model class. The Hammerstein-bilinear approach has been applied to an industrial heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) system, which has also been the underlying application addressed in this thesis. A unique set of dynamic control design purpose oriented air temperature and humidity Hammerstein-bilinear models of an environmentally controlled clear room manufacturing zone has been identified. The greater insights afforded by the knowledge of the system nonlinearities then allow for enhanced control tuning of the associated commercial HVAC control system leading to an improved overall control performance.

Submitted by William Justo Figueiro (williamjf) on 2015-06-26T22:57:56Z No. of bitstreams: 1 43.pdf: 3316113 bytes, checksum: 59a696189af2b9803f0adedd6828d93e (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2015-06-26T22:57:56Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 43.pdf: 3316113 bytes, checksum: 59a696189af2b9803f0adedd6828d93e (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012 / Banco Santander / Banespa / O trabalho apresenta um estudo do sistema de climatização do aeroporto da cidade de Porto Alegre, visando determinar e mensurar as oportunidades de redução dos seus custos operacionais utilizando o tanque de termoacumulação já existente, recurso que por razões diversas encontra-se atualmente inoperante. Para possibilitar uma avaliação global do comportamento do sistema em estudo, tanto a edificação do terminal de passageiros quanto os equipamentos integrantes da sua planta de climatização foram modelados e simulados através do programa EnergyPlus, com uso de arquivo climático específico para a cidade de Porto Alegre. As simulações ratificaram as previsões de que o sistema de climatização do aeroporto de Porto Alegre trabalha atualmente com custos de operação superiores àqueles que poderiam ser obtidos caso o sistema de termoacumulação estivesse em operação. A economia integrada ao longo de um ano pela redução de custos com as faturas de energia do aeroporto atingiu R$ 312.206,00. Ficou evidente que a redução da demanda e consumo de energia em horário de ponta são as parcelas com maior representatividade na diminuição dos custos operacionais do sistema de climatização do aeroporto, respondendo, respectivamente, por 77% e 18% sobre todas as economias obtidas nas faturas de energia após o uso da termoacumulação. Constatouse que além da redução nos valores pagos pela utilização de energia elétrica em horário de ponta, a participação da termoacumulação possibilita também redução no consumo energético dos equipamentos da planta de climatização, motivada por estratégias de operação mais eficientes. Desta forma, considerando apenas os meses de verão, as simulações apontaram uma redução média de 11% no consumo referente aos equipamentos da planta de climatização. Se para o mesmo período forem também contabilizadas as economias devido redução de demanda e consumo em horário de ponta dos equipamentos de climatização, a redução total sobre a fatura de energia do aeroporto a partir do uso da termoacumulação situase em 30%. Outra importante questão relacionada ao uso da termoacumulação diz respeito à ampliação da capacidade frigorífica que a mesma proporciona ao sistema de climatização, efeito de elevada relevância para fazer frente ao aumento na movimentação de passageiros da aviação civil dos últimos anos. Nesse sentido, as simulações apontaram um incremento de cerca de 25% na capacidade de refrigeração da planta atual, após participação do tanque de termoacumulação. Tal efeito representa notória contribuição ao aumento da longevidade das instalações existentes, limitando ou eliminando a necessidade de maiores intervenções para aumento de capacidade de refrigeração da planta até o momento em que o terminal de passageiros venha a sofrer ampliações mais significativas. / The study presents the heating, ventilation and air conditioning system (HVAC) used in Porto Alegre city airport, aiming cost reductions opportunities due to its cool storage tank operation, a feature that for various reasons is currently out use. To enable a comprehensive assessment of the system’s behavior, both the passenger terminal building and HVAC equipment were modeled and simulated using the EnergyPlus software, along with the weather file that contains Porto Alegre’s meteorological data. The simulations have reaffirmed the predictions that Porto Alegre’s airport HVAC system is currently working with operating costs above those that could be obtained if the cool storage system were in operation. The integrated economy over a year by reducing costs to the electricity bills from the airport reached R$ 312.206,00. It became notorious that the reduction of demand and energy consumption during the peak hours are the most representative from all economies, accounting respectively for 77% and 18% of the total energy bills savings after cool storage tank operation. It was found that, besides the reduction in the amounts paid for electricity at peak hours, the participation of cool storage also enables reduction in energy consumption for HVAC plant equipments, driven by more efficient operating strategies. Thus, considering only the summer months, the simulations showed an average reduction of 11% in HVAC plant equipment consumption. As for the same period, if it is also accounted for the savings due to electric demand and consumption reduction during peak hours, the total energy bill reduction for the airport after applying the cool storage tank stands at 30%. Another important issue related to the use of cool storage is the HVAC cooling capacity increase, very relevant if considering the terminal passenger handling increase along last years. In that sense, the simulations showed a 25% increase in cooling capacity for the current system after the cool storage has joined the HVAC plant. This effect is a noticeable contribution to the existing installations longevity, as it limits or eliminates the need for further increase in the airport cooling capacity, not until the time when the passenger terminal may suffer significant enlargements.

Noise control in the heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) systems is one of the critical design parameters in measuring the occupant comfort. The noise generated by air-handling units propagates through the ducts in the axial as well as transverse direction. Noise radiated in the transverse direction from the duct walls excited by the internal sound field is called the breakout noise. An analytical formulation has been developed in this thesis in order to predict the breakout noise by incorporating three-dimensional effects along with the acoustical and structural wave coupling phenomena. The first step in the breakout noise prediction is to calculate the interior acoustic response and flexural vibration displacement of the compliant walls. Dynamic interaction between the internal acoustic subsystem and flexible structural subsystem has been expressed in terms of the modal characteristics of the uncoupled response of the acoustic and structural sub-systems. Solutions of the inhomogeneous wave equation are rearranged in terms of impedance and mobility, and the equations describing the complete system are expressed in terms of matrices, which result in a compact matrix formulation. Examples of the formulation are a rectangular cavity with one flexible wall and a rectangular cavity with four-flexible walls. The formulation is modified to incorporate complex boundary conditions by means of appropriate Green’s functions. It is implemented for flexible wall duct using the modified cavity Green’s function. Another objective of the present investigation is to understand the coupling phenomenon and its effect on the compliant wall vibration displacement. The developed three-dimensional analytical analysis of the breakout noise is convenient to implement on the computer, and also to extend the sub-system level model to the system level model in order to analyze a complex acoustic-structural system for the breakout noise problem. The extent of coupling is calculated using a transfer factor based on the uncoupled natural frequencies of the acoustic and structural subsystems. It is observed from the free vibration analysis that a coupling between the cavity and the flexible panel exists in the vicinity of an uncoupled acoustic natural frequency. If a strong coupling occurs between an acoustic mode and a panel mode, then damping of structural subsystem would control it. The cavity volume changes stiffness of the panel, which in turn affects noise radiation in the stiffness-controlled region. The second step is to calculate the sound power radiated from complaint wall. The wall vibration velocity is a linear combination of the uncoupled flexural modes of the structural subsystem. It is substituted into the Rayleigh integral and Kirchhoff– Helmholtz (KH) integral formulation to predict the sound pressure radiated by the vibrating duct wall. The radiated sound power can be obtained by integrating the acoustic intensity over the surface of the flexible duct wall making use of appropriate expressions for radiation impedance. The radiation impedance terms involve a quadruple integral. Evaluation of this integral is quite complex and poses formidable computational challenges. These have been overcome by means of a co-ordinate transformation. Sound power radiation from flexible walls of the plenum and duct walls has been calculated using an equivalent plate model. Analytical results are corroborated with numerical models. The second part of thesis deals with a one-dimensional model to predict the breakout noise from a thin rectangular duct with different end conditions like anechoic termination, rigid-end termination, and the open-end termination. This model incorporates acoustic reflection effects in the duct internal sound field by using standing wave pattern by means of the transfer matrix approach. A one-dimensional prediction method based on the four-pole parameters has been developed to evaluate the lagged duct performance in terms of the breakout noise reduction. Radiation impedance of a duct is calculated by three different methods: (i) finite line source model (ii) finite cylinder model, and (iii) equivalent plate model based on fundamental bending mode of the duct. It is observed that the proposed model that uses the equivalent plate model for the lagged duct and the line source model for the bare duct is appropriate to predict the transverse insertion loss of the lagging, particularly at the lower frequencies that are of primary interest for reducing the breakout noise of rectangular ducts. The bare duct breakout noise results are compared with those of the corresponding 3-D analytical models. It shows that the one-dimensional model captures the overall mean pattern of breakout noise very well. The third part of the thesis examines the internal acoustic field and thence the transmission loss (TL) of a rectangular expansion chamber, the inlet and outlet of which are situated at arbitrary locations of the chamber; i.e., the sidewall or the face of the chamber. The four-pole parameters have been expressed in terms of an appropriate Green’s function of a rectangular cavity with homogeneous boundary conditions. A transfer matrix formulation has been developed for the yielding-wall rectangular chambers by considering structural-acoustic coupling. It may be combined readily with the transfer matrices of the other constituent elements upstream and downstream in order to compute the overall transmission loss or insertion loss. Wherever applicable, parametric studies have been conducted to evolve the design guidelines for minimizing the breakout noise from the HVAC ducts, plenums and cavities.

This research is intended to discover business reasons for utilizing renewable energy applications in buildings to help extend the life of the heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) systems. It is designed to focus on gleaning information from the United States and China. These two countries differ politically, socially, economically and culturally. In history, trading and other economic activity has always been a point of common ambitions. Therefore studying business and economic reasons for applying renewable energy applications will be edifying.

I detta examensarbete simuleras ett värmehanteringssystem i Matlab Simulink för en elektrisk lastbil, det för att värmehantera fordonets klimat. Där en värmepump används för nedkylning av kupé och batteri samt en PTC (elektrisk värmare) för uppvärmning av detsamma. Värmepumpen fungerar genom att kompressorn förångar R-134a kylmedlet i systemet som sedan omvandlas till vätska vid nedkylning av kondensorn som utbyter energi med omgivande luften. Vätskan skickas vidare till en mottagare som filtrerar kylmedlet för att sedan överföras till en expansionsventil som kontrollerar trycket i systemet. Vätskan går sedan till evaporatorn för att kylas ned av ett utbyte med varmare omgivande luft från kupén, därefter börjar nedkylningsproessen om. PTC värmaren har en passiv uppvärmningsfunktionaliteten som tar emot ström genom ett motstånd och värmer komponenten med hjälp av en vattencykel. Batteriets räckvidd minskar vid fel temperaturer därav kan batteriets temperatur kontrolleras i drift. Det för att teoretiskt öka räckvidden på fordonet genom att ha batteriet vid en mer gynnsam temperatur. En förstudie genomförs där data samlas in för att sedan modellera och redovisa simulerade resultat som åstadkoms för olika scenarion med uppvärmning och nedkylning. Det visar sig att systemets batteri tar för lång tid vid nedkylning och uppvärmning på grund av dess stora massa. Detta då batteriet inte når måltemperaturen under simuleringens gång som körs i 1 timme och därav inte efter komforttiden som är 10 minuter. Vidare når kupéns delar önskad temperatur inom simuleringstiden förutom under kupéns nedkylning där taket kyls långsammare än önskat. Den enda delen av kupén som uppnår komforttiden är kupéns sidor vid uppvärmning. Vilket betyder att optimeringar på systemet bör tillämpas för att åstadkomma bättre och mer realistiska resultat. / In this thesis, a thermal management system is simulated in Matlab Simulink for an battery electric truck, in order to thermally manage the vehicle's climate. A heat pump is implemented to cool down the cabin and battery while a PTC (electric heater) is implemented to heat the systems respectively. The heat pump works by the compressor vaporizing the R-134a refrigerant in the system, which is then converted to liquid when cooled by the condenser, which exchanges energy with the surrounding air. The liquid is sent further to a receiver that filters the refrigerant and is then transferred to an expansion valve that controls the pressure in the system. The liquid then goes to the evaporator to be cooled by an exchange with warmer ambient air from the vehicle cabin, after which the cooling process begins again. The PTC heater has a passive heating functionality that receives current through a resistor and heats the component using a coolant loop. The battery's range is reduced at incorrect temperatures, therefore the battery's temperature can be checked during operation. This is to theoretically increase the range of the vehicle by having the battery at a more favorable temperature. A pre-study is carried out where data is collected to then model, and present simulated results that were achieved for different scenarios with heating and cooling. It turns out that the system's battery takes too long to cool down and warm up due to its large mass. This is because the battery does not reach the target temperature during the course of the simulation, which is run for 1 hour, and therefore not after the comfort time which is 10 minutes. Furthermore, the parts of the cabin reach the desired temperature within the simulation time, except during the cooling down of the cabin, where the roof cools more slowly than desired. The only part of the cabin that achieves the comfort time is the sides of the cabin when heated. Which means that optimizations to the system should be applied in order to achieve better and more realistic results.

Uncertainty analysis is crucial to any thorough analysis of an engineering system. Traditional uncertainty analysis can be a tedious task involving numerous steps that can be error prone if conducted by hand. If conducted with the aid of a computer, these tasks can be computationally expensive. In either case, the process is quite rigid. If a parameter of the system is modified or the system configuration is changed, the entire uncertainty analysis process must be conducted again giving more opportunities for calculation errors or computation time. Modular uncertainty analysis provides a method to overcome all these obstacles of traditional uncertainty analysis. The modular technique is well suited for computation by a computer which makes the process somewhat automatic after the initial setup and computation errors are reduced. The modular technique implements matrix operations to conduct the analysis. This in turns makes the process more efficient than traditional methods because computers are well suited for matrix operations. Since the modular technique implements matrix operations, the method is adaptable to system parameter or configuration modifications. The modular technique also lends itself to quickly calculating other uncertainty analysis parameters such as the uncertainty magnification factor, and the uncertainty percent contribution. This dissertation will focuson the modular technique, the extension of the technique in the form the uncertainty magnification factor and uncertainty percent contribution, and the application of the modular technique to different type of energy systems. The modular technique is applied to an internal combustion engine with a bottoming organic Rankine cycle system, a combined heat and power system, and a heating, ventilation, and air conditioning system. The results show that the modular technique is well suited to evaluate complex engineering systems. The modular technique is also shown to perform well when system parameters or configurations are modified.