Hybrid metaheuristic optimization of HVAC energy consumption and thermal comfort in an office building using EnergyPlus

Akraminejad, Reza, Zhao, Tianyi, Rezgui, Yacine ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5711-8400, Ghoroghi, Ali and Shahbazi Razlighi, Yousef 2025. Hybrid metaheuristic optimization of HVAC energy consumption and thermal comfort in an office building using EnergyPlus. Buildings 15 (14) , 2568. 10.3390/buildings15142568

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Abstract

Energy is a critical resource, and its optimization is central to sustainable building design. Occupant comfort, significantly influenced by factors, including mean radiant temperature (MRT), alongside air temperature, velocity, and humidity, is another key consideration. This paper introduces a hybrid crow search optimization (CSA) and penguin search optimization algorithm (PeSOA), termed (HCRPN), designed to simultaneously optimize building energy consumption and achieve MRT levels conducive to thermal comfort by adjusting HVAC system parameters. We first validate HCRPN using ZDT-1 and Shaffer N1 multi-objective benchmarks. Subsequently, we employ EnergyPlus simulations, utilizing a single-objective Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) for initial parameter analysis to generate a dataset. Following correlation analyses to understand parameter relationships, we implement our hybrid multi-objective approach. Comparative evaluations against state-of-the-art algorithms, including MoPso, NSGA-II, hybrid Nsga2/MOEAD, and Mo-CSA, validated the effectiveness of HCRPN. Our findings demonstrate an average 7% reduction in energy consumption and a 3% improvement in MRT-based comfort relative to existing methods. While seemingly small, even minor enhancements in MRT can have a noticeable positive impact on well-being, particularly in large, high-occupancy buildings.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Schools > Engineering
Publisher:	MDPI
ISSN:	2075-5309
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	23 July 2025
Date of Acceptance:	18 July 2025
Last Modified:	23 Jul 2025 09:45
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/179930

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