A monitoring system for identification and validation of the energetic model of a building using Wireless Sensor Networks

Buildings are, at a large extent, responsible for the carbon footprint, and regulation laws are emerging to reduce it. To this end energy saving policies must be established per individual building, involving building analysis and modeling, model identification and validation, proposal of actions to improve the energy efficiency, estimation of energy savings using that building model, implementation of the improvement actions, and experimental verification of the energy savings. The final objective is not only a reduction in the greenhouse emission, but also to get monetary savings that make these improvement actions attractive to building owners or holders. A key element in this process is the ability of measuring a set of variables regarding energy consumption, climate, and operating conditions of the building, Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) is a suitable technology for this proposal, due to its installation easiness, low cost and good performance. In this paper, an application layer has been designed on top of a ZigBee protocol for identification and validation of the energetic model of a building for the purposes of increasing its energy efficiency. A practical implementation in the 20.000 m² School of Engineering, University of Seville, is also shown where one hundred sensors were deployed in a section of the building. A hybrid network (wired and wireless) has been used to cover such a large area taking profit of existing infrastructure.