Combining energy dynamic simulation and multi-criteria analysis for supporting investment decisions on smart shading devices in office buildings

In the framework of the current energy transition, the building sector is experiencing a smart revolution, recognizing how the adoption of advanced control strategies and smart management systems can increase buildings energy efficiency and improve occupants’ comfort. As a key element for smart buildings, solar shading devices coupled with effective control systems need to be strategically assessed. The investment decision-making process for selecting the proper shading systems is influenced by the existence of potential conflicts from economic, environmental, social, and energy standpoints, thus asking to be supported by innovative methodological approaches able to include all these aspects in the decisional framework. To this purpose, the work aims to propose a multi-disciplinary methodological framework to support decision-makers in ranking a set of solar shading device and relative control strategy, integrating energy dynamic simulations with multi-criteria decision analysis techniques. The analysis focuses on office buildings, recognizing their huge impact in terms of energy consumptions and the need to guarantee proper indoor conditions to increase employees’ productivity and well-being. To test the applicability of the multi-step methodology for this building category, the proposed approach is applied to an office building located in the North-West of Italy, aiming to assess and compare different alternative combinations of shadings devices and management strategies. The advanced features of building energy modelling and simulation and the application of PROMETHEE II (Preference Ranking Organization METHod for Enrichment Evaluation II) method as multi-criteria analysis allows to provide recommendations to decision-makers to identify the systems to be installed, able to guarantee the best trade-off between internal comfort, operational energy, and environmental costs for the building under investigation.