Investigation of occupant behaviour in residential buildings

Abstract

The present research seeks to characterise occupant behaviours in a residential setting to improve the predictive skill of residential energy simulation models. To date only a handful of studies have been done in Australian residential environments because of the difficulty and cost of building up a large sample size. As a result it has been common to apply adaptive comfort models derived from office building studies in residential settings, despite the expectation that occupants in the latter context would have more adaptive opportunities, given that the degree of control over their environment in office environment is usually quite restricted. The objective of this thesis is to establish an empirical basis to better understanding occupant behaviours and perception of comfort in the residential context. A longitudinal field observation campaign was conducted in 41 Australian homes in South-East Queensland across a one-year period (2019-21). A custom data acquisition system was developed and deployed in each participant’s home to monitor the indoor environment and operations of A/Cs and windows. An online comfort questionnaire was administered to the sample householders via their smartphones. This study explores an alternative modelling approach that is capable of predicting diverse occupant actions on A/C operations and window openings in relation to outdoor and indoor environmental stimuli. The study also examined the perception of thermal comfort and behavioural adaptation of residents in different climates of Australia. Further analysis was performed on a large-scale time use survey conducted at the national level from the Australian Bureau of Statistics to reproduce occupancy and energy-related behaviours in Australian households. The empirical findings from this study provide evidence-based behavioural models and simulation settings to more accurately predict indoor environmental conditions and energy consumption in residential buildings.