Smart Heating System for Residential Apartments

Sammanfattning: HFAB is always striving to satisfy their customers energy demand and at the same time followdirectives within the company, where saving a certain amount of energy every year is included.For this reason, the heating system in their apartments is set to deliver about 21ºC. However, thereare some customers who feel that 21 °C is not warm enough, and therefore choose to plug in anelectrical radiator to raise the temperature. This solution often results in an expensive electricitybill and a poorly optimized temperature increase, due to the manner of how the mechanicalthermostats are configured by the landlord. Thus, the aim of this study was to find a solutionsystem for HFAB where the customers had the option to pay for the extra heat in addition to the 21°C, which in turn would lead to lower electricity consumption and cost for the consumers.To achieve this goal, test methods were created to acquire temperature data from various solutionsystems, provided by different companies and also from the current solution that the customershave been using. Calculations about how much heat (power) was needed to achieve temperaturesabove 21ºC in a room were made. Cost evaluations of the electricity consumed by the solutionsystems and different heat packages were also estimated.The study showed that, the temperature set range value from digital thermostats was higher (upto 28°C) compared to the mechanical ones (21ºC) when such solution systems were installed inthe hot-water radiators. That allowed the use of an electrical radiator in a room to raise thetemperature without shutting the hot-water radiators off. When it comes to the electricityconsumption, one test showed that the customer had an option to save up to 42% of the electricalcost when using these solution systems. The indicated cost saving has been possible due to theautomatically operation of the electrical radiator via wireless relays.