EHCM Toolbox
What is it?
The energy hub component modelling (EHCM) toolbox is a unified framework for controlling the operation of the energy hub and the buildings it connects to. The energy hub concept allows one to manage a collection of buildings in a cooperative manner, by providing opportunities for load shifting between buildings and the sharing of expensive but energy efficient equipment housed in the hub, such as heat pumps, boilers, batteries. Typically, control design for the buildings and the energy hub are done separately, underutilizing the potential flexibility provided by the interconnected system. The EHCM Toolbox uses simplified modelling techniques for the devices, and modular models built from libraries of commonly used component descriptions. The buildings models are based on the BRCM toolbox.
Features
- Providing models for possible components of an energy hub:
o Generation units (photovoltaics)
o Storage units (batteries, hot water tanks)
o Conversion units (heat pumps, chillers, boilers - Providing the interface to the grid (electrical/gas) and to the buildings
- Using approved building models based on the BRCM toolbox
- Simulation of the energy hub model
- Framework for testing advanced combined building and energy hub control methods
Installation
The Toolbox package installer tbxmanager has a broken link which we have not been able to fix. So until further notice a zip archive of the BRCM toolbox is being made available via the following download link: DownloadBRCMToolbox_v1.03.zip (ZIP, 2 MB)vertical_align_bottom. The original tbxmanager installation instructions and links are provided below as they maybe in useful in the installation process.
A zip archive of the EHCM toolbox is also available via the following download link: DownloadEHCMToolbox_v1.zip (ZIP, 11.7 MB)vertical_align_bottom.
The BRCM Toolbox is available via tbxmanager, which simplifies the installation and update of freely available Matlab toolboxes.
To install the BRCM Toolbox for the first time, follow these steps in Matlab:
- Install tbxmanager as described on the external pagewebpage.call_made
- Install BRCM by typing in Matlab:
tbxmanager install brcm - Install the EHCM toolbox by typing in Matlab:
tbxmanager install ehcm
- To check for updates type:
tbxmanager update
Documentation
A EHCM Toolbox Manual is available as a Downloaddownloadable PDF (PDF, 206 KB)vertical_align_bottom.
Copyright and License
The copyright is with the Automatic Control Lab, ETH Zurich.
The Toolbox is licensed under external pageGPLv3call_made If you are interested in a different licensing scheme, please contact the Automatic Control Laboratory.
Contact
If you have any suggestions for improving the toolbox we would be happy to hear from you. Please contact Prof. Roy Smith at the Automatic Control Laboratory, ETH Zurich.
Authors
This toolbox is the work of:
- Georgios Darivianakis
- Angelos Georghiou
- Roy S. Smith
- John Lygeros
References
The Toolbox is described in a manual.
The following papers are also useful references.
[1] Georgios Darivianakis, Angelos Georghiou, Roy S Smith, and John Lygeros. A Stochastic Optimization Approach to Cooperative Building Energy Management via an Energy Hub. Proc. Conference on Decision and Control, pages 7814-7819, 2015.
[2] Georgios Darivianakis, Angelos Georghiou, Roy S Smith, and John Lygeros. The Power of Diversity: Data-Driven Robust Predictive Control for Energy Efficient Buildings and Districts. IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology, 27(1): 132 - 145, 2019.
[3] Georgios Darivianakis, Angelos Georghiou, Annika Eichler, Roy S Smith, and John Lygeros. Scalability through Decentralization: A Robust Control Approach for the Energy Management of a Building Community. Proc. IFAC World Congress, pages 14879-14884, 2017.
[4] Georgios Darivianakis, Annika Eichler, Roy S Smith, and John Lygeros. A Data-Driven Stochastic Optimization Approach to the Seasonal Storage Energy Management. IEEE Control Systems Letters, 1(2): 394-399, 2017.