US2013124251A1PendingUtilityA1
Optimal planning of building retrofit for a portfolio of buildings
Est. expiryJun 1, 2031(~4.8 yrs left)· nominal 20-yr term from priority
G06Q 50/06G06Q 50/16G06Q 10/04G06Q 10/06313
61
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0
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0
Claims
Abstract
Generating an optimal planning of building retrofit for a portfolio of buildings may include providing a plurality of objective functions that may be selected for maximizing cost reduction, maximizing green house gas emission reduction, or maximizing energy reduction, or combinations thereof. The objective function may be solved based on information including at least a retrofit cost for retrofitting a building, payback period specifying the length of time needed to recover the retrofit cost, a budget available for retrofitting the building, expected price of energy, estimated energy savings from retrofitting and estimated green house gas emission from retrofitting. The planning of building retrofit may be generated based on the solutions of one or more of the objective functions, which may provide for an optimal plan of building retrofit.
Claims
exact text as granted — not AI-modifiedWe claim:
1 . A method of generating a planning of building retrofit for a portfolio of buildings, comprising:
receiving input information including at least a retrofit cost for retrofitting a building, payback period specifying the length of time needed to recover the retrofit cost, a budget available for retrofitting the building, expected price of energy, estimated energy savings from retrofitting and estimated green house gas emission from retrofitting; selecting an optimization model based on an objective, the objective including maximizing cost reduction, maximizing green house gas emission reduction, or maximizing energy reduction, or combinations thereof; and generating the planning of building retrofit based on the selected optimization model and the retrofit cost for retrofitting a building, the payback period specifying the length of time needed to recover the retrofit cost, the budget available for retrofitting the building, the expected price of energy, the estimated energy savings from retrofitting and the estimated green house gas emission from retrofitting.
2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the received input information comprises a list of buildings that are candidates for retrofitting and a retrofit list of items that are to be replaced or improved in each of the candidate buildings, and
wherein the optimization model maximizes a return of investment which is expressed as overall energy savings in a monetary unit from all the items in the retrofit list in all the candidate buildings during the playback period minus overall costs of implementing the retrofits of the candidate buildings.
3 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the optimization model includes:
max
Energy
Reduction
=
max
∑
i
∈
ECM
∑
j
∈
BLD
R
i
,
j
·
E
i
,
j
for generating the planning that maximizes energy reduction, wherein
R i,j ε{0,1},
E i,j =energy reduction of retrofit associated with ECM i in building j.
4 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the optimization model includes:
max
GHG
Reduction
=
max
∑
i
∈
ECM
∑
j
∈
BLD
∑
l
∈
ENR
R
i
,
j
(
E
i
,
j
·
G
l
)
for generating the planning that maximizes green house gas emission reduction, wherein
lε{Eng} energy type,
R i,j ε{0,1} associated with ECM i in building j,
E i,j =energy reduction of retrofit associated with ECM i of building j.
G l =GHG emission for each energy type.
5 . The method of claim 1 , further including:
developing a heat transfer model associated with the building; and estimating the energy savings from retrofitting based on the developed heat transfer model.
6 . The method of claim 5 , further including:
estimating the green house gas emission from retrofitting based on the estimated energy savings from retrofitting.
7 . The method of claim 5 , wherein the heat transfer model includes:
Q
sys
=
(
h
q
,
wall
A
wall
+
h
q
,
roof
A
roof
+
h
q
,
win
A
win
+
m
.
inf
C
p
)
∫
t
0
t
1
(
T
z
-
T
amb
(
τ
)
)
+
τ
=
(
A
wall
R
wall
+
A
roof
R
roof
+
A
window
R
window
+
m
.
inf
C
p
)
∫
t
0
t
1
(
T
z
-
T
amb
(
τ
)
)
+
τ
wherein,
h q,wall , h q,roof , h q,win , {dot over (m)} inf represent heat transfer coefficients for wall, roof, windows and infiltration of outside air into a building respectively;
A wall , A roof , A win represent areas of wall, roof and window in a building, respectively;
C p , T z , T amb represent specific heat of air inside a building, temperature of inside of a building zone, and ambient outside temperature, respectively;
τ represents an integration variable; and
R wall , R roof , k win represent heat resistance coefficients of wall, roof and window, respectively.
8 . The method of claim 1 , wherein further including:
developing a statistical regression model that describes energy usage of a building in terms of building characteristics; and predicting the energy savings from retrofitting based on the statistical regression model.
9 . The method of claim 8 , further including:
estimating the green house gas emission from retrofitting based on the predicted energy savings from retrofitting.
10 . The method of claim 8 , wherein the statistical regression model includes:
E j,energy type =β 0 +β 1 x 1 +β 2 x 2 +β 3 x 3 + . . . +ε energy type
wherein x i represents building characteristic i, β 0 is a constant value contributing to building j's energy usage, which is not associated with building characteristics, β i represents a coefficient value that a building characteristic x i contributes to the energy usage in that building, and ε is an error value, which cannot be attributed to the building characteristics or other energy usage in building j.
11 . A computer readable storage medium storing a program of instructions executable by a machine to perform a method of generating a planning of building retrofit for a portfolio of buildings, comprising:
receiving input information including at least a retrofit cost for retrofitting a building, payback period specifying the length of time needed to recover the retrofit cost, budget available for retrofitting the building, expected price of energy, estimated energy savings from retrofitting and estimated green house gas emission from retrofitting; selecting an optimization model based on an objective, the objective including maximizing cost reduction, maximizing green house gas emission reduction, or maximizing energy reduction, or combinations thereof; and generating the planning of building retrofit based on the selected optimization model and the generating the planning of building retrofit based on the selected optimization model and the retrofit cost for retrofitting a building, the payback period specifying the length of time needed to recover the retrofit cost, the budget available for retrofitting the building, the expected price of energy, the estimated energy savings from retrofitting and the estimated green house gas emission from retrofitting.
12 . The computer readable storage medium of claim 11 , wherein the received input information comprises a list of buildings that are candidates for retrofitting and a retrofit list of items that are to be replaced or improved in each of the candidate buildings, and
wherein the optimization model maximizes a return of investment which is expressed as overall energy savings in a monetary unit from all the items in the retrofit list in all the candidate buildings during the playback period minus overall costs of implementing the retrofits of the candidate buildings.
13 . The computer readable storage medium of claim 11 , wherein the optimization model includes:
max
Energy
Reduction
=
max
∑
i
∈
ECM
∑
j
∈
BLD
R
i
,
j
·
E
i
,
j
for generating the planning that maximizes energy reduction, wherein
R i,j ε{0,1} associated with ECM i in building j,
E i,j =energy reduction of retrofit associated with ECM i in building j.
14 . The computer readable storage medium of claim 11 , wherein the optimization model includes:
max
GHG
Reduction
=
max
∑
i
∈
ECM
∑
j
∈
BLD
∑
l
∈
ENR
R
i
,
j
(
E
i
,
j
·
G
l
)
for generating the planning that maximizes green house gas emission reduction, wherein
lε{Eng} energy type,
R i,j ε{0,1} associated with ECM i in building j,
E i,j =energy reduction of retrofit associated with ECM i in building j.
G l =GHG emission for each energy type.
15 . The computer readable storage medium of claim 11 , further including:
developing a heat transfer model associated with the building; and estimating the energy savings from retrofitting based on the developed heat transfer model.
16 . The computer readable storage medium of claim 15 , further including:
estimating the green house gas emission from retrofitting based on the estimated energy savings from retrofitting.
17 . The computer readable storage medium of claim 15 , wherein the heat transfer model includes:
Q
sys
=
(
h
q
,
wall
A
wall
+
h
q
,
roof
A
roof
+
h
q
,
win
A
win
+
m
.
inf
C
p
)
∫
t
0
t
1
(
T
z
-
T
amb
(
τ
)
)
+
τ
=
(
A
wall
R
wall
+
A
roof
R
roof
+
A
window
R
window
+
m
.
inf
C
p
)
∫
t
0
t
1
(
T
z
-
T
amb
(
τ
)
)
+
τ
wherein,
h q,wall , h q,roof , h q,win , {dot over (m)} inf represent heat transfer coefficients for wall, roof, windows and infiltration of outside air into a building respectively;
A wall , A roof , A win represent areas of wall, roof and window in a building, respectively;
C p , T z , T amb represent specific heat of air inside a building, temperature of inside of a building zone, and ambient outside temperature, respectively;
τ represents an integration variable; and
R wall , R roof , R win represent heat resistance coefficients of wall, roof and window, respectively.
18 . The computer readable storage medium of claim 11 , wherein further including:
developing a statistical regression model that describes energy usage of a building in terms of building characteristics; and predicting the energy savings from retrofitting based on the statistical regression model.
19 . The computer readable storage medium of claim 18 , further including:
estimating the green house gas emission from retrofitting based on the predicted energy savings from retrofitting.
20 . The computer readable storage medium of claim 18 , wherein the statistical regression model includes:
E j,energy type =β 0 +β 1 x 1 +β 2 x 2 +β 3 x 3 + . . . +ε energy type
wherein x i represents building characteristic i, β 0 is a constant value contributing to building j's energy usage, which is not associated with building characteristics, represents a coefficient value that a building characteristic x i contributes to the energy usage in that building, and ε is an error value, which cannot be attributed to the building characteristics or other energy usage in building j.
21 . A system for generating a planning of building retrofit for a portfolio of buildings, comprising:
a processor; a first optimization model with an objective function of maximizing cost reduction; a second optimization model with an objective function of maximizing green house gas emission reduction; a third optimization model with an objective function of maximizing energy reduction; and a module operable to execute on the processor, and further operable to receive a selected objective, and based on the selected objective, solve the first optimization model, the second optimization model, or the third optimization model, the module solving the first optimization model, the second optimization model, or the third optimization model based on data including at least a retrofit cost for retrofitting a building, payback period specifying the length of time needed to recover the retrofit cost, budget available for retrofitting the building, expected price of energy, estimated energy savings from retrofitting and estimated green house gas emission from retrofitting, the module further generating the planning of building retrofit based on the solving of the first optimization model, the second optimization model, or the third optimization model.
22 . The system of claim 21 , wherein the data comprises a list of buildings that are candidates for retrofitting and a retrofit list of items that are to be replaced or improved in each of the candidate buildings, and
wherein the first optimization model maximizes a return of investment which is expressed as overall energy savings in a monetary unit from all the items in the retrofit list in all the candidate buildings during the playback period minus overall costs of implementing the retrofits of the candidate buildings.
23 . The system of claim 21 , wherein the third optimization model comprises:
max
Energy
Reduction
=
max
∑
i
∈
ECM
∑
j
∈
BLD
R
i
,
j
·
E
i
,
j
for generating the planning that maximizes energy reduction, wherein
R i,j ε{0,1} associated with ECM i in building j,
E i,j =energy reduction of retrofit associated with ECM i in building j.
24 . The system of claim 21 , wherein the second optimization model comprises:
max
GHG
Reduction
=
max
∑
i
∈
ECM
∑
j
∈
BLD
∑
l
∈
ENR
R
i
,
j
(
E
i
,
j
·
G
l
)
for generating the planning that maximizes green house gas emission reduction, wherein
lε{Eng} energy type,
R i,j ε{0,1} associated with ECM i in building j,
E i,j =energy reduction of retrofit associated with ECM i in building j.
G l =GHG emission for each energy type.Join the waitlist — get patent alerts
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