Use of Calibrated Simulation for the Evaluation of Residential Energy Conservation Options of Two Habitat for Humanity Houses in Houston, Texas

This paper describes a project where selected energy conservation measures in two Habitat for Humanity houses in Houston, Texas were measured using sideby-side measurements of identical houses and calibrated simulation. The measures include shell tightening, improved A/C efficiency, modifications to the DHW heater, and solar screens. To perform the analysis both houses were instrumented with hourly data loggers for more than one year to record energy use and environmental conditions and the data analyzed using several methods including an inverse fourier series method and calibrated DOE-2 simulations. The results indicate that several of the energy conservation measures performed as estimated when all confounding factors were removed using simulation. The confounding factors that needed to be normalized with the simulation included: the weather conditions, Merences in the life styles of the two houses, and omissions in the construction of the houses (Bou-Saada, et al. 1998). This paper discusses the instrumentation installed in the houses and the efforts that were undertaken to calibrate the DOE-2 simulation to the energy efficient house. The paper by Haberl et al. (1998) discusses the results of simulating the ECRMs.