A multi-energy load prediction of a building using the multi-layer perceptron neural network method with different optimization algorithms

Abstract

Since cooling and heating loads are recognized as key characteristics for evaluating the energy efficiency of buildings, it appears indisputable that they must be predicted and analyzed for residential structures. Accordingly, the multi-layer perceptron neural network is applied for predicting the heating and cooling loads using the experimental dataset. The used dataset is obtained by monitoring the impact of the building's dimensions on energy consumption. To optimize the training process of the multi-layer perceptron neural network, several optimizers are employed. Besides, different statistical performance indicators are considered to see which selected optimizer outperforms the rest in terms of accuracy and authenticity. The obtained results emphasize the remarkable performance of adaptive chaotic grey wolf optimization, which can be used to train the multi-layer perceptron neural network and forecast the buildings’ energy consumption with the highest accuracy. According to the obtained results, the hybrid multi-layer perceptron neural network- adaptive chaotic grey wolf optimization method demonstrates the best performance. The optimum number of neurons in the hidden layer is obtained to be 15. Also, based on the statistical performance indicators, the selected method reveals an R 2 of 0.9123 and 0.9419 for cooling and heating loads, respectively.