Abstract:

Sensitivity analysis represents an important role in the energy consumption in buildings since this analysis can have a significant effect in the simulation results. Therefore a bad estimation of critical parameters could significantly affect the final decision making. In this article a friendly methodology to carry out sensitivity analysis is presented. Due to the large amount of existing design parameters and variables, this methodology includes the selection of the most important ones to reach the design objectives. Moreover the three most suitable types of sensitive analysis are also presented and one of them is selected to perform the study. The final contribution of each parameter in the energy consumption of the building to reach the design indoor environmental quality is described and discussed.

The sensitive analysis is made using the simulation environment TRNSYS and the generic optimization tool GenOpt. A building is chosen and simulated by means of TRNSYS and the influence of different characteristics and parameters is investigated through the generic software GenOpt.
The methodology presented can be converted in a useful and practical guide which is utilized in practices of building simulation for engineering students.

Due to the generic features of the used tools and the procedure, this methodology can be effectively implemented in other simulation software.

Keywords:

Genopt, sensitivity analysis, methodology.