Over the last few decades, total energy consumption has increased while energy resources remain limited. Energy demand management is crucial for this reason. To solve this problem, predicting and forecasting water-cooled chiller power consumption using machine learning and deep learning are presented. The prediction models adopted are thermodynamic model and multi-layer perceptron (MLP), while the time-series forecasting models adopted are MLP, one-dimensional convolutional neural network (1D-CNN), and long short-term memory (LSTM). Each group of models is compared. The best model in each group is then selected for implementation. The data were collected every minute from an academic building at one of the universities in Taiwan. The experimental result demonstrates that the best prediction model is the MLP with 0.971 of determination (R2), 0.743 kW of mean absolute error (MAE), and 1.157 kW of root mean square error (RMSE). The time-series forecasting model trained every day for three consecutive days using new data to forecast the next minute of power consumption. The best time-series forecasting model is LSTM with 0.994 of R2, 0.233 kW of MAE, and 1.415 kW of RMSE. The models selected for both MLP and LSTM indicated very close predictive and forecasting values to the actual value.
Axial flow fans are commonly used for a system or machinery cooling process. It also used for ventilating warehouses, factories, and garages. In the fan manufacturing industry, the demand for varying fan operating points makes design parameters complicated because many design parameters affect the fan performance. This study combines the deep neural network (DNN) with a genetic algorithm (GA) for axial flow design and development. The characteristic fan curve (P-Q Curve) can be generated when the relevant fan parameters are imported into this system. The system parameters can be adjusted to achieve the required characteristic curve. After the wind tunnel test is performed for verification, the data are integrated and corrected to reduce manufacturing costs and design time. This study discusses a small axial flow fan NACA and analyzes fan features, such as the blade root chord length, blade tip chord length, pitch angle, twist angle, fan diameter, and blade number. Afterwards, the wind tunnel performance test was performed and the fan performance curve obtained. The feature and performance test data were discussed using deep learning. The Python programming language was used for programming and the data were trained repeatedly. The greater the number of parameter data, the more accurate the prediction. Whether the performance condition is met could be learnt from the training result. All parameters were calculated using a genetic algorithm. The optimized fan features and performance were screened out to implement the intelligent fan design. This method can solve many fan suppliers’ fan design problems.
The chiller is the major energy consuming HVAC component in a building. Currently, huge chiller data is easy to obtain due to Internet of Things (IoT) technology development. In order to optimize the chiller system, this study presents a data mining technique that utilizes the available chiller data. The data mining techniques used are prediction model, clustering analysis, and association rules mining (ARM) analysis. The dataset was collected every minute for a year from a water-cooled chiller at an institutional building in Taiwan and from meteorological data. The power consumption prediction model was built using deep neural networks with 0.955 of , 4.470 of MAE, and 6.716 of RMSE. Clustering analysis was performed using the k-means algorithm and ARM analysis was performed using Apriori algorithm. Each cluster identifies those operational parameters that have strong association rules with high performance. The operational parameters from ARM were simulated using the prediction model. The simulation result shows that the ARM operational parameters can successfully save the energy consumption by 22.36 MWh or 18.17% in a year.
6 March 2025 in Engineering Applications of Artificial Intelligence