Monitoring Building Energy Performance Under Occupancy

One of the largest consumers of world’s energy is the building industry. Optimizing energy consumption during building operation can go a long way toward reducing our impact on the global environment. “Real-time” energy use monitoring and energy performance monitoring, has become very popular these days both from the perspective of real time feedback for energy saving behavior and also for justifying existing and future system design. When assessing building energy system and energy performance, it is necessary to measure the amount of energy consumed by a building to satisfy the demand for different functions and occupant activities. This paper shows an approach to monitor building’s energy performance under occupancy by installing sensors in the case study building at Fort McMurray, Alberta. To begin with, different types of sensors were selected based on the data required to assess occupant energy usage (electrical energy usage, space heating system’s energy usage, and household water usage), thermal performance of building envelope and indoor air quality measurement. These sensors were then installed in different locations of selected case study units. To evaluate the impact of different orientation and the impact of different occupant size on energy usage records, some criteria that are relevant in this study have been included in the selection process of sample case study units. A management system was also adopted to collect data from the sensors installed in the case study units. Finally, the available data are analyzed to monitor occupant’s energy usage and building energy performance. This paper also suggests a user interface for real time data visualization to monitor building’s energy performance under occupancy. It is expected that the real time energy usage record can be used to make intelligent decisions to save energy and to justify the existing energy system that is adopted in the case study building.