The Impact of Uncertain Physical Parameters on HVAC Demand Response

Journal Article · Sat Mar 01 00:00:00 EST 2014 · IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid, 5(2):916-923

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1109/TSG.2013.2295540· OSTI ID:1129351

Sun, Yannan; Elizondo, Marcelo A.; Lu, Shuai; Fuller, Jason C.

HVAC units are currently one of the major resources providing demand response (DR) in residential buildings. Models of HVAC with DR function can improve understanding of its impact on power system operations and facilitate the deployment of DR technologies. This paper investigates the importance of various physical parameters and their distributions to the HVAC response to DR signals, which is a key step to the construction of HVAC models for a population of units with insufficient data. These parameters include the size of floors, insulation efficiency, the amount of solid mass in the house, and efficiency of the HVAC units. These parameters are usually assumed to follow Gaussian or Uniform distributions. We study the effect of uncertainty in the chosen parameter distributions on the aggregate HVAC response to DR signals, during transient phase and in steady state. We use a quasi-Monte Carlo sampling method with linear regression and Prony analysis to evaluate sensitivity of DR output to the uncertainty in the distribution parameters. The significance ranking on the uncertainty sources is given for future guidance in the modeling of HVAC demand response.

• Research Organization: Pacific Northwest National Lab. (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE
• DOE Contract Number: AC05-76RL01830
• OSTI ID: 1129351
• Report Number(s): PNNL-SA-94265
• Journal Information: IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid, 5(2):916-923, Journal Name: IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid, 5(2):916-923
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English