A real-time control using wireless sensor network for intelligent energy management system in buildings

Industrial evolution brings major new challenges due to increasing energy demands. This phenomenon encourages the improvement of control methodologies that reduce resource requirements. It has been lately observed that the building sector contributes considerably to final energy demand. For example, electricity used in France by this sector has reached 284 TWh, accounting for 65% of all electricity consumed in 2007 (434 TWh), and this situation continues to increase. Moreover, the link between increased CO2 emissions and the use of energy is also considered, particularly in the building environment. 404 million tones of CO2 gas is emitted in France, and 22.6% originates from this sector. In the light of developments in microelectro-mechanical systems (MEMS), along with progress made in communication and embedded smart sensors, the building sector has a huge potential for mitigating demand. This paper deals with techniques and advanced load management strategies for BEMS. First, we present the architecture of this system that exploits several communication techniques. We then describe an application for a heating control which is based on the wireless sensor network (WSN). This application uses an innovative realtime control method that allows peak consumption to be reduced while maintaining thermal comfort. This method is tested and the experiment results demonstrate that the proposed method is able to control heating loads to adapt to any problems that may arise (by taking into account changing price, signals from energy provider and distribution system operator, etc).