A wet-bulb temperature-adaptive sequencing strategy for hospital chiller plants: Integrating Gordon-Ng and ε-NTU models to optimize energy consumption

Researchers investigated the characteristics and operation of chiller plants in inpatient buildings in southwestern China. The GN (Gordon-Ng) chiller model and ε- NTU cooling tower model to calculate the maximum cooling capacity of the chiller with wet bulb temperature as input. Two optimization strategies were proposed: Strategy-Y1, which considers the optimal energy efficiency range, and Strategy-Y2, which takes into account the outdoor wet bulb temperature. A case study was conducted on an inpatient building in Chengdu. The operating data of the chiller plants( energy consumption (kW), evaporator water supply temperature (°C), evaporator water flow rate (kg/s), etc.) were collected as experimental input parameters, and the COP-PLR curve of the chiller was regressed. Simulation results showed that the energy consumption effects of chillers and chiller plants in Strategy-Y1 were reduced by 3.72% and 2.93%, respectively. Thus, Strategy-Y2 can save the energy consumption of chiller and chiller plants by 10.92% and 8.68% respectively.