Application of model based predictive control for water-based floor heating in low energy residential buildings

A model based predictive control method is applied in order to determine the optimal supply fluid temperature in the case of concrete embedded water-based floor heating in low energy residential buildings The aim of the control is to keep the indoor temperature within a defined comfort interval The forthcoming supply fluid temperature is obtained through a numerical optimisation based on a prediction of the upcoming heat demand The elementary response function which is the basis for the method is obtained from a numerical control volume model and as an alternative from a simplified 2-node lumped model The accuracy of the results obtained from the simplified model is surprisingly good in comparison to the detailed numerical model The control method is applied for a single room for which a perfect prognosis of the heat demand exists The results show a fairly steady optimised supply fluid temperature (C) 2010 Published by Elsevier Ltd