Approaches to Analyzing the Thermal Performance of Commercial Buildings

Building thermal performance monitoring involves acquiring appropriate data, adjusting a thermal model to that data, and using the adjusted thermal model to answer questions regarding actual or potential building thermal operation. A monitoring method is thus classified by data type, model used, and calculation procedures. Data types are based upon the aggregation level of inherent spatial andtemporal variations. The two most useful thermal models are long-term energy balance and macrodynamic simulation. Calculations involve a choice of 'reference building' to be assumed for savings or retrofit analyses and procedures for normalizing building size, occupancy, and weather. Using this framework, several examples are analyzed.