Development of a combined energy-demands calculator for urban building communities in Korea

A decision-support tool based on relational database technology is developed to aid the planning of energy supply systems for urban communities. The building-load models derived from the data measured or surveyed in Korea over the last two decades are computerized using Microsoft Access® as an application platform. The tool calculates energy demands for arbitrary combinations of buildings in an urban community without requiring detailed technological information. Nonexpert urban planners can use the package by providing simple input parameters such as floor area, building type, and city where the site is located. The program calculates the time series based on the demands for electricity, heating, cooling, and hot water loads for the 8760 hours of a year. It also produces indicative characteristics of each load type such as the annual maximums, trends of the daily maximums and minimums, and the annual sums of energy. Urban planners can use these characteristics of the load profiles in their decision processes at the early stages of planning. The detailed time series can be further exploited for subsequent analysis, such as device operational simulation or cost estimation if more sophisticated analysis is necessary. A case study for an actual project is presented for demonstrational purposes. <br> <b>Keywords:</b> building energy load, urban community energy, time series, software package, Korea