ENERGY OPTIMIZATION OF SERBIAN BUILDINGS WITH SOLAR COLLECTORS AND DIFFERENT PV SYSTEMS

Abstract

In the modern world today, the significant part of the total energy consumption is related to the building, so research and development of methods for improving energy efficiency in buildings are very important. In this paper it is investigated the Serbian residential building with photovoltaic panels and solar collectors on the roof. The building with electrical space heating is analyzed. Energy optimization (including embodied energy) was performed with the major aim to determine the optimal area of the PV array and solar collector area on the roof. With the optimal PV and solar collector areas, primary energy consumption may be minimized. The residential buildings with variable PV cell efficiency are investigated in order to achieve zero-net energy building (ZNEB) or positive-net energy building (PNEB). The buildings are simulated in EnergyPlus environment. Open Studio plug-in in Google SketchUp was used for buildings design, Hooke-Jeeves algorithm for optimization and GENOPT software for software execution control. The obtained results gave the optimal size of PV array and solar collectors system. With these optimal sizes, the concept ZNEB and PNEB can be achieved.