Finding the cost-optimal mix of building energy technologies that satisfies a set operational energy reduction target

This paper presents the development of an optimization methodology for selecting the lowest monetary cost combinations of building technologies to meet set operational energy reduction targets. The developed optimization algorithm comes from the fact that the actual properties of building technologies have a discrete nature and seeing their selection as a combinatoric problem. The optimization algorithm searches the discrete combinatoric space by maximizing the objective function: calculated energy savings divided by premium cost. The algorithm is codified into a custom MATLAB script and when compared to prescriptive methodologies is shown to be much more cost effective and can be generically applied given a palette of building technology alternatives and their corresponding cost data.