In-situ optimization of chilled water plants

A model based optimization method for determining optimized operating conditions to minimize overall power consumption of a chiller plant having a plurality of chillers of equal capacity and from the same manufacturer, a plurality of cooling towers, a plurality of chilled water pumps and a plurality of condenser water pumps arranged in parallel and coupled to a common header on a chilled water side and a common header on a condenser water side, the method comprising:

• identifying each of the plurality of chillers in the chiller plant;
• identifying each of the plurality of cooling towers in the chiller plant;
• identifying each of the plurality of chilled water pumps in the chiller plant;
• identifying each of the plurality of condenser water pumps in the chiller plant;
• generating a chiller performance model and a chiller stalling model for each of the plurality of chillers in the chiller plant;
• generating a cooling tower performance model for each of the plurality of cooling towers in the chiller plant;
• generating a chilled water pump performance model for each of the plurality of chilled water pumps in the chiller plant;
• generating a condenser water pump model for each of the plurality of condenser water pumps in the chiller plant;
• formulating a chiller plant optimization model;
• receiving chiller plant input data from the chiller plant;
• solving the chiller plant optimization model using the chiller plant input data;
• generating optimized chiller plant subsystems outputs;
• comparing the optimized chiller plant subsystems outputs to current operating chiller plant subsystems;
• generating projected energy savings of the optimized chiller plant subsystems;
• comparing the projected energy savings to an energy saving threshold value;
• when the projected energy savings exceeds the energy saving threshold value, sending the optimized chiller plant subsystems output to a building control system.