Quantitative description and simulation of human behavior in residential buildings

An in-depth understanding of building energy use requires a thorough understanding of human behavior. This research gives a quantitative description of human behavior in residential buildings. This quantitative description method can be used to forecast the impact of the human behavior on the indoor building environment and energy use. Human behavior influences the energy use directly and indirectly by changing window openings, air-conditioner usage, lighting, etc. This quantitative description method describes these behavioral effects. Behavior can be divided into several types according to the usage with time related, environmentally related and random modes used to quantitatively describe the behavior. The method is then applied to describe a Beijing household with comparison to on-site observations of the resident's behavior and measurements of energy use to validate the method. The results show that the human behavior in the real world can be quantified by the quantitative description method. These simulation tools can greatly facilitate building energy conservation by describing the influence of human behavior on building performance and energy use.