Energy Flexibility Study of a Hotel Using TRNSYS

In this work, a TRNSYS model of a five-story hotel located in Northern Italy is used to evaluate simple energy flexibility strategies for the cooling season to be used in a possible smart grid integration. The strategies are demandside and include energy efficiency and load shifting. Two models are used, one of the building envelopes, to evaluate the instantaneous heating and cooling demands, and the HVAC system model, used to simulate the heating and cooling production by two multifunctional heat pumps and two heat pump boosters for the domestic hot water production. The flexibility strategies are applied in the building model controlling the room thermostats while the heating and cooling demands are calculated using measured occupation profiles. On the other hand, the hot and cold-water tanks set point temperatures are used to implement the energy flexibility of the HVAC system. In both cases, the target is to shift the loads in the PV panels production hours, reducing the electricity demands from the grid during the other hours.