Indoor Temperature and IAQ Control in an Office

Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning systems are essential for maintaining thermal comfort and Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) while influencing building energy consumption. This paper presents a simulation-based study of a residential heating system addressing temperature and IAQ control. CO2 is considered as IAQ parameter. The model is developed in MATLAB/Simulink using Simscape libraries to capture the coupled thermal and moisture dynamics of the indoor environment. Occupancy acts as a disturbance by affecting heat, moisture, and CO2 emissions, affecting indoor conditions. Natural ventilation (windows opening) is activated based on suitable CO2 thresholds. In addition, two room temperature control strategies are compared: a traditional bang-bang control strategy and a PI controller. Suitable scenarios are exploited to provide a qualitative and quantitative analysis.