Characterizing Variations in the Indoor Temperature and Humidity of Guest Rooms with an Occupancy-Based Climate Control Technology

Hyojin Kim and Emily Oldham
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Hyojin Kim: Hillier College of Architecture and Design, New Jersey Institute of Technology, Newark, NJ 07102, USA
Emily Oldham: DLR Group, Washington, DC 20004, USA

Energies, 2020, vol. 13, issue 7, 1-21

Abstract: This paper characterizes variations in the indoor temperature and humidity profiles of actual guest rooms equipped with Occupancy-Based Climate Control (OBCC) systems that were used to initiate a temperature setback to 15.6 °C in the winter and to 26.7 °C in the summer in the guest rooms. Empirical knowledge of these conditions can provide useful insights for an improved field demonstration and optimization of OBCC, as well as for a more realistic temperature and occupancy input for building simulations for hotel guest rooms. As a result, one year of one minute temperatures and humidity data was characterized against outdoor climate for three different occupancy modes, which was useful to identify the observed room-to-room variations in heat losses and resultant indoor temperatures during the heating season due to the different dynamic heat balance conditions of the guest rooms. This indicated potential discomfort in the rooms that appeared to have a stronger association between outdoor and indoor temperatures, which was also identified from the thermal comfort survey indicating thermostat-related discomfort sources. Interestingly enough, the guests who stayed in these rooms tended to set their thermostat at higher setpoint temperatures when they occupied the room, which appeared to compensate for the low balance-point temperatures of these rooms.

Keywords: occupancy-responsive thermostat; card-key control system; hotel; thermal comfort; temperature setback; occupant behavior in buildings (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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