PERFORMANCE-BASED STRATEGIES FOR PLUS-ENERGY RESIDENTIAL PROTOTYPING IN EGYPT

Abstract

Net-zero and net-plus energy residential prototypes are becoming high prioritized due to the significant impact the buildings imply on the energy consumption and the environment. The aim of this thesis is to establish a performance-based mathematical model capable of predicting the overall performance of a Photovoltaic (PV) system in residential prototyping located in Cairo, Egypt. This thesis also documents and analyzes the renewable design strategies and technologies adopted in current practice of residential net-zero and net-plus energy buildings. This thesis focuses mainly on PV systems, where a methodology to investigate how the impact of design variations of a pre-defined set of parameters for a PV system on the total energy generated can be estimated through a few number of experiments is presented. This addressed four parameters; the type of the PV technology used and three geometric parameters including; Area, Tilt and Azimuth. The main effects and interactions between these parameters are computed using matrix algebra and multiple linear regression. A representative case study in Cairo, Egypt is presented as an implementation of the proposed methodology to deduce a prediction model from a 24-1 fractional factorial. The outcome of this model is validated against results from dynamic thermal simulation. Results show that good estimates of most of these parameters are obtained, where aliasing is only limited to the two-factor interactions, which is an acceptable trade-off. The model is applied to a hypothetical case study unit where the algebraic expression is integrated within the parametric setup used to build this unit.