Optimal Dead Band Control of Occupant Thermostats for Grid-Interactive Homes

Efficient and grid-aware management of home-scale heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems is one of the key enablers of demand-side management (DSM) and associated grid services in the residential sector. HVACs regulate the indoor temperature around a set point through a thermostat operating within a closed-loop control scheme. Conventional thermostats typically have a built-in temperature dead band or differential where the thermostat is idle, and HVAC stays at the most recent state (On/Off). The temperature dead band is an important control parameter that can help save energy as well as preventing frequent On/Off switching cycles leading to excessive wear and tear on the equipment. However, strategic and dynamic adjustment of the dead band can be a challenging task for an occupant. This paper proposes a mixed-integer linear program (MILP)-based tuning scheme to optimally determine the dead band. The novelty in this formulation is the inclusion of thermostat hysteresis curve modeled by piecewise techniques for tuning the dead band accurately. The proposed formulation is solved as a receding horizon manner for normal as well as under a demand response (DR) event and has been found it can achieve up to 10% reduction in energy consumption without degrading the regulation performance significantly.