Applied Thermal Engineering 58 (2013) 305e313

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Applied Thermal Engineering

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/apthermeng

Performance analysis of small capacity absorption chillers by using

different modeling methods
Jerko Labus a, Joan Carles Bruno b, *, Alberto Coronas b
a
b

Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, University of Belgrade, Kraljice Marije 16, 11000 Belgrade, Serbia
Universitat Rovira i Virgili, CREVER, Av. Pasos Catalans 26, 43007 Tarragona, Spain

h i g h l i g h t s

Comparison of four empirically based models: GNA, DDt0 , MPR, ANN.

Experimental data of 12 kW absorption chiller are used for modeling.

DDt0 , MPR, ANN methods are suitable for complex simulation environments.

The statistical indicators and tests show a slight advantage of the ANN method.

a r t i c l e i n f o

a b s t r a c t

Article history:
Received 11 February 2013
Accepted 12 April 2013
Available online 2 May 2013

This paper presents a review and comparison of simple, yet accurate steady-state models of small capacity absorption chillers using highly reliable experimental data obtained with an absorption chiller of
12 kW in a state-of-the-art test bench. These models can potentially be used in complete modeling and
simulation tools or in supervisory control strategies for air-conditioning systems using absorption
chillers.
With respect to that, a comparative evaluation of different modeling methods for predicting the absorption chiller performance is presented. Four empirically based models: the adapted Gordon-Ng model
(GNA), the characteristic equation model (DDt0 ), the multivariable polynomial model (MPR) and the
articial neural networks model (ANN) were applied using the experimental data and thoroughly
examined. The paper also presents statistical indicators and tests which might assist in selection of the
most appropriate model.
The excellent statistical indicators such as coefcient of determination (>0.99) and coefcient of
variation (<5%) clearly indicate that it is possible to develop highly accurate empirical models by using
only the variables of external water circuits as model input parameters.
2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords:
Absorption chillers
Performance analysis
Modeling
Statistical indicators

1. Introduction
The main aim of this paper is to present a comparative evaluation of different modeling approaches for predicting the performance of small absorption chillers. The comparative evaluation can
serve as a reference when there is a need for simple, but accurate
models of absorption chillers, for example to integrate these
models in complete energy supply and demand models included in
simulation software packages. These simple chiller models, characterized by a low number of input parameters, can serve to facilitate the annual simulations of complex building systems providing
at the same time an adequate level of performance prediction. Also,

* Corresponding author. Tel.: 34 977 297068; fax: 34 977559691.

E-mail address: juancarlos.bruno@urv.cat (J.C. Bruno).
1359-4311/$ e see front matter 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.applthermaleng.2013.04.032

this paper aims to provide a statistical approach which may help in

selecting the appropriate model.
With respect to absorption chiller modeling, both physical and
empirical approaches were many times presented in the literature.
Physical or more precise thermodynamic models were reported by
many authors. Here just a brief review of the most recent or relevant will be given. Grossman and Zaltash [1] developed a modular
simulation tool for absorption systems called ABSIM. With this
software is possible to study various absorption cycle congurations using different working uids. ABSIM calculates the cycle
internal state points and thermal loads in each component using a
cycle conguration build by the user graphically and for given
working uid specications and operating conditions. This is
enabled through the governing equations for each component of
the cycle contained in the software subroutines. However, the
calculation convergence is not always easy. Silverio and Figueiredo

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J. Labus et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 58 (2013) 305e313

[2] used a thermodynamic approach for steady-state simulation of

an ammonia-water absorption system. The thermodynamic state
relations, the pressure drop equations and the heat transfer coefcients were solved by using an algorithm based on the Substitution Newton Rapshon method. Kaynakli and Kilic [3] performed a
theoretical study on the performance of a H2OeLiBr absorption
system using a thermodynamic analysis of the absorption cycle.
These authors investigated the inuences of the driving temperature and heat exchanger effectiveness on the thermal loads of the
components and COP. Yin et al. [4] developed a detailed thermodynamic model of a 16 kW double-stage H2OeLiBr absorption
chiller. The steady-state model was based on the working uids
property relations, detailed mass and energy balances, and the heat
and mass transfer relationships for each chiller component. One of
the most recent application of the thermodynamic approach in
absorption system modeling can be found in the paper of Wu et al.
[5]. The authors developed thermodynamic models of different
absorption heat pump cycles to test their applicability with
different heat sources, working pairs and in different cold regions.
All these thermodynamic models are very demanding since they
require comprehensive knowledge of the absorption cycle
including some internal state points. These models need lots of
input parameters such as heat transfer coefcients (U) and heat
transfer areas (A) of heat exchangers, the rich solution ow rate,
working uid properties and water side ows and temperatures as
well as some additional assumptions for the convenience of
modeling. A more complete explanation on all these degrees of
freedom in the modeling of absorption chillers can be found in
Dereje et al. [6]. In practice, however, especially with commercial
units, the internal parameters are not available. This is the reason
why thermodynamic models are more adequate during the design
stage of absorption equipment as explained in the paper of Florides
et al. [7]. Also, the computation time in simulation software packages using these models is very long since they require a lot of
simultaneous iterations. The annual simulation of absorption
chillers under different ambient and operating conditions on an
hourly time step basis is a clear example of this.
Thus, there is a need for simple models which can provide
sufciently good representation of the absorption machine
behavior based only on available external parameters (experimental measurements or manufacturer catalog data). Simple
models can be more easily incorporated in simulation programs or
used for fault detection and control. Contrary to the physical
models, the empirical and semi-empirical models require less time
and effort to develop and computation time is much shorter when
they are built into complete energy management simulation programs. The parameters and tting coefcients in these models are
determined by using a regression method or a minimization algorithm applied to a dataset obtained performing experimental
measurements or using a manufacturer catalog.
The studies about development of empirically based models for
absorption chillers have been reported by several authors. Gordon
and Ng [8] developed a general model for predicting the absorption
chillers performance. The model lays both on physical and empirical principles. The physical principles that govern the performance
of the absorption chiller are tted to the experimental or manufacturer data by using a regression method. Ziegler et al. [9,10]
developed a model (Characteristic equation method) which predicts the performance of the absorption chiller by using two simple
algebraic equations: one to calculate the cooling capacity and
another for the driving heat input. These two previous models
belong to semi-empirical (gray-box) category of models, in which
the tted parameters can be interpreted under the actual physical
principles which govern the absorption chiller performance. Labus
et al. [11] used a completely empirical approach to model

absorption chillers based on manufacturers curves in order to

investigate the energy savings when different absorption chiller
congurations were considered for their integration in a complete
chiller plant.
The Articial neural networks approach has been also used for
absorption chiller modeling. ANN models belong to the black-box
model category, that unlike gray-box models, the estimated parameters of the model have no physical interpretation. Szen [12]
used the ANN to determine thermodynamic properties of an
alternative working pair for absorption systems. The study also
demonstrated that ANN can replace mathematical models in the
simulation of absorption systems. In the paper of Szen and
Akayol [13] the ANN approach was proposed for performance
analysis of an absorption chiller. The ANN model used only the
working temperatures in the four main components as input parameters in order to predict the performance of the chiller. Manohar et al. [14] applied ANN for the modeling of steam red double
effect absorption chiller. Later, a similar work was carried out by
Rosiek and Batlles [15], who used ANN to model solar-assisted air
conditioning system with hot water driven double effect absorption
chiller. The last approach considered in this paper is the simple
multivariable polynomial regression which also belongs to the
black-box category of models.
Regardless the numerous studies on the modeling of absorption
equipment, literature review shows that there is a lack of information with respect to comprehensive comparative studies on
different modeling techniques for predicting absorption equipment
performance in a similar way as Swider [16] or Lee et al. [17] did for
the case of vapor-compression chillers.
The main aim of this paper is to present a comparative evaluation of different modeling approaches for predicting the performance of absorption systems. In the next section are presented the
experimental data and a brief description of the evaluated types of
models. Later the application of these models to the experimental
data is evaluated with the help of statistical indicators and statistical tests to select the best modeling approach.
2. Experimental data and absorption chiller models
Four different types of absorption chiller models were developed and examined:

Adapted GordoneNg model,

Adapted characteristic equation model,
Multivariate polynomial regression model and
Articial neural networks model.

The experimental data required for the models development

were obtained in the state-of-the-art test bench of the Rovira i
Virgili University in Tarragona (Spain). The test bench is fully
equipped to test under controlled operation conditions a variety of
units commonly used in HVAC systems. A more detailed explanation about the functionality of the test bench can be found in Labus
et al. [18] and Labus [19]. For the models described in this research
the data were collected in a series of experiments with a 12 kW
absorption chiller Pink Chilli PSC12. The measured variables in the
experiments were inlet and outlet temperatures of hot, chilled, and
cooling water circuit; volumetric ow rates and pressure drop in
each circuit; and electric consumption of the chiller. The raw data
were processed using a comprehensive test procedure which includes several techniques: data reduction, development of steadystate detector with additional ltering and uncertainty estimation.
Based on external measurable parameters only, this procedure allows the creation of the complete performance map for absorption
machines based on highly accurate data. In data reduction, the

J. Labus et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 58 (2013) 305e313

collected data were used to calculate thermal loads and efciency

coefcients. Off-line steady-state detector for absorption chillers
was developed based on analogy with steady-state detector for
vapor compression chillers using the moving window average.
Additional data ltering was engaged to eliminate remaining
transient periods caused by time delays when changing from one
steady-state to another. The evaluation of experimental uncertainty
was carried out by judgment based on available information on the
possible variability of input quantities. When the uncertainties of
heat loads were evaluated, the following input quantities were
taken into account: inlet and outlet temperatures of external circuits, volumetric ow rate, density, and specic heat capacity.
Uncertainty contribution for temperature and volumetric ow rate
was calculated as a combination of different sources of uncertainty:
repeatability, accuracy of the instrument and resolution of the instrument. In order to be in accordance with international standards, time length for the steady-state tests was not shorter than
30 min collected in 5s intervals. The experimental database used for
modeling consists of 138 steady-state points and covers the
following temperatures ranges: inlet hot water temperature 80e
100  C, inlet cooling water temperature 27e35  C and outlet chilled
water temperature 5e12  C, as presented in Table 1. The main criterion to select these three temperatures as input variables for the
empirical models was their availability to the operating engineers
in practical applications. In detail description of the test procedure
as well as the experimental results can be found online in Labus
PhD thesis [19].
Also, it is important to explain the inuence of database size on
modeling. Models developed with small datasets are not reliable
and statistically correct, since small datasets are insufcient to form
strong relationships within the models. On the other hand, the
models created with large dataset which completely covers the
operating range of the absorption chiller show very high level of
predicting capabilities.

the absorber and condenser as a single source of heat at medium

temperature.
According to Gordon and Ng approximation, the nite-rate mass
transfer is roughly temperature independent. With respect to that,
the losses in the evaporator can be neglected, while the losses in
other two heat exchangers (generator, absorber/condenser) can be
viewed as a constant characteristic of each particular chiller. The
general equation for the GNA model can be obtained after series of
transformation, starting from the First law of thermodynamics and
using the entropy balance which takes into account the dominant
irreversibility [8,19]. The GNA model calculates the inverse of COP
using the following equation (Eq. (1)):

# "
# "
# "
#
"
in
in
Tgen
Tgen
1
T in  T out
1

$
ac out eva $ in
:
in
in  T in
Teva
COP
Tgen  Tac
Tgen
Qeva
ac
#
"
in
Tac
$ a1  a2 $ in
Tgen

and a2 as the intercept and slope of this line using linear regression.
Bearing in mind that the purpose of this analysis is to compare
different modeling approaches by means of the deviations between
experimental and modeled heat loads, the nal equation of the
GNA model (eq. (1)) was adapted to obtain the chiller capacity (Eq.
(2)). The heat input can be derived from the COP (Eq. (3)).
:

B
1=COP  A

(2)

B
1  A$COP

(3)

2.1. Adapted GordoneNg model (GNA)

Table 1
Experimental operation range conditions.
Variable

Range

in [ C]
Teva
out [ C]
Tac
in [ C]
T:gen

[4.98e12.1]
[26.95e35.01]
[79.9e100.12]
[0.49e15.23]
[5.99e41.98]
[4.64e24.04]
[0.11e0.76]

Q: eva [kW]
Q: ac [kW]
Q gen [kW]
COP
:

Flow rates [m3/h] xed at: meva 1:7; mac 4:8;

:
mgen 2:2

(1)

where a1 and a2 are the regression parameters to be tted with

experimental data and, at the same time, the constants which
characterize the entropy generation of particular chiller.
"
in  T in
in
Tgen
Tac
ac
against

Considering that a plot of
in
in $COP
Tgen
Tgen
#
in  T out
:
Tac
eva
$Qeva leads to a straight line, is it possible to calculate a1
out
Teva

Q eva

The general thermodynamic model for absorption chillers

developed by Gordon and Ng [8] is actually a combination of
physical and empirical approaches. According to the authors, the
dominant irreversibility of the absorption chillers is nite-rate
mass transfer. The losses due to the nite-rate mass transfer can
therefore be approximated as temperature independent. The
original model was based on external input parameters of the four
main components (generator, condenser, evaporator and absorber)
assuming that manufacturers catalogs provide the operating conditions for each of them. However, the current manufacturers
practice is to provide operating curves based on three circuits, i.e.
treating absorber and condenser as one component. The main
reason for that is the arrangement in series of the absorber and
condenser in the majority of the commercial absorption chillers.
Therefore, in our case the original model was modied considering

307

Q gen
where:

# "
#
in
in  T out
Tgen
Tac
eva
$ in
;
A
out
in
Teva
Tgen  Tac
# "
#
"
in
in
Tgen
Tac
$ a1  a2 $ in
B
in  T in
Tgen
Tgen
ac
"

(4)

2.2. Adapted characteristic equation model (DDt0 )

For the modeling of absorption chillers, Ziegler et al. [9] developed an approximate method which is able to represent both
cooling capacity and driving heat input by simple algebraic equations. These equations are expressed as a function of so-called
characteristic temperature difference (DDt), which depends on the
average temperature of the external heat carrier uids. One of the
main assumptions is that the heat transfer processes in absorption
chillers dominate their performance behavior. In this way, a complex
response to all external heat carrier temperatures is reduced to a
linear function of heat ow and the external temperatures.
A simple linear correlation is very convenient, but it has been
found that the predicted performance of the cooling capacity deviates considerably from the linear behavior, for instance, at high

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J. Labus et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 58 (2013) 305e313

driving temperatures, due to higher internal losses. With respect to

that, an adapted characteristic equation method was proposed by
Kuhn and Ziegler [20]. This improved model uses a numerical t of
catalog or experimental data to improve the characteristic equation. The adapted characteristic temperature function (DDt0 ) takes
the form (Eq. (5)):

DDt 0 tgen  a$tac e$teva

(5)

And the linear characteristic equation for each component loads

k (Eq. (6)):
:

Q k s0 $DDt 0 r

(6)

Combining Eqs. (5) and (6) yields one correlation which represents the thermal performance of the components as a function of
the external arithmetic mean temperatures of the generator (tgen),
absorber-condenser (tac) and evaporator (teva), when the external
ow rates are constant.
:

Q k s0 $tgen  s0 $a$tac s0 $e$teva r

(7)

The four parameters (s, a, e and r) are estimated by using a

multiple linear regression algorithm to t the experimental data.
This algorithm chooses regression coefcients to minimize the residual sum of squares. The analyses of Puig-Arnavat et al. [21]
conrmed the capability of the DDt0 method to obtain good results and also better accuracy than the original method DDt. Finally,
the combination of the obtained characteristic functions with the
equations of the external arithmetic mean temperatures and with
the external energy balances, results in a system of six equations
with six unknowns which can easily be solved. The developed
model requires only three temperatures (one from each of the
external circuits) at constant ow rates of external heat carriers to
predict the performance of the absorption chiller.
2.3. Multivariate polynomial regression model (MPR)
The MPR models belong to the black-box category of models,
which do not carry the information about the physical processes
incorporated in the model structure. MPR models are a very
effective tool for describing complex non-linear relationships between input and output variables without disregarding what occurs within the system. The parameters for the MPR model are
calculated by tting the experimental data minimizing the sum of
squares of the residuals using a polynomial function. Due to their
simple structure, MPR models have been applied in various elds
such as forecasting, control, optimization, fault detection and
diagnosis [17,22]. Lee et al. [17] proved that MPR model of vaporcompression water chiller can have a high prediction accuracy,
with the coefcient of variation of 0.61%. Similarly, the paper of Kim
et al. [22] conrmed that MPR models are acceptable for fault
detection and diagnosis of residential heat pump systems. A typical
polynomial regression model contains the squared and higher order terms of the estimator variable. Normally, the higher order MPR
models offer better accuracy of prediction. However, high-order
MPR can become impractical due to its excessive number of parameters. One of the common techniques in the case of the high
order MPR models with large number of parameters is to reduce
the model by retaining only those parameters that are statistically
signicant. Also, excessive polynomial order for a relatively small
database may worsen data interpolation. These are some of the
reasons why it has been decided to apply only second order polynomials to predict the absorption chiller performance. Thus, the
MPR models were developed to calculate the thermal loads of the
absorption chiller by using the measurements of external circuits:

generator inlet temperature, absorber/condenser inlet temperature, and evaporator outlet temperature. The generalized second
order model in case of absorption chillers can be represented using
Eq. (8):
:

in
out
in
in
out
Q k b0;k b1;k Tgen
b2;k Tac
b3;k Teva
b4;k Tgen
Tac

2
in
in
out in
in
b5;k Tgen
Teva
b6;k Tac
Teva b7;k Tgen


2
 out 2
in
b8;k Tac
b9;k Teva

(8)

2.4. Articial neural network model (ANN)

ANN models also belong to the group of black-box models. An
articial neural network is an adaptive system which can be trained
to perform a particular function or behavior on the basis of input
and output information that ows through the network. ANN have
found their place in the elds of modeling, identication, optimization and control in steady state and dynamic systems due to their
ability to model complex relationships between inputs and outputs
or to nd patterns in data. Various applications of neural networks
in renewable energy problems such as energy prediction and
optimization of energy consumption in building service systems
were presented in the review of Kalogirou [23]. The review of
Mohanraj et al. [24] covers the applications of ANN in energy and
exergy analysis of refrigeration and air-conditioning systems, their
control and in prediction of refrigerant properties. Moon et al. [25]
developed an adaptive control method using the ANN model to
enhance thermal comfort in buildings. Yabanova and Keebas [26]
developed ANN-based PID controller for geothermal district heating system in Turkey, which increased energy efciency and cost
saving of the system by 13%. The most common ANN architecture
applied in the eld of absorption systems and their applications are
feed-forward neural networks with back-propagation [27].
In this research, ANN models of the absorption chiller were
developed by using MatLab Neural Network toolbox. Since there is
no explicit rule to determine the topology of ANN (the number of
neurons in the hidden layer or the number of hidden layers) the
trial and error method is usually applied to nd the best solution.
Thus, the adopted topology for ANN models was (3e7e1), as
illustrated in Fig. 1. Each model consists of one input layer with
three variables, one hidden layer with seven neurons and one
output layer with one output: a component load (three different
ANN models are built for thermal power exchanged in the evaporator, absorber/condenser and generator). The training of the ANN
was based on the error back propagation technique using the
LevenbergeMarquardt algorithm of optimization. The input parameters were normalized in the [0.2, 0.8] range. A hyperbolic
tangent sigmoid function (tansig) was used in the hidden layer and
the linear transfer function (purelin) was used in the output layer.
To test the robustness and the prediction ability of the models, the
experimental dataset was split into three parts: 70% of data was
used for the model training, 20% for the model validation and the
remaining 10% for the model testing.
The ANN absorption chiller model to calculate the thermal load
in each component is given by the general equation (Eq. (9)):
:

Qk

j
X
i

"
LW1;j $

2
  1

P
R
1 exp  2
1 IWj;R IR b1j

!#
b2
(9)

where I is the input, R is the number of the inputs (R 3), b1 are

biases in the hidden layer, b2 are biases in the output layer, J is the

J. Labus et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 58 (2013) 305e313

Fig. 1. ANN topology.

number of neurons in the hidden layer (J 7), and IW and LW are

the weights in the input and output hidden layer, respectively.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Model parameters
The developed models require different parameters in order to
calculate the absorption chiller performance. All these parameters
were estimated according to the methods explained above and they
are listed in the appendix.
3.2. Evaluation of the models
3.2.1. Simple comparison
Fig. 2 shows the comparison of the measured and calculated
cooling capacity of the chiller with a generator and condenser/
absorber temperature of 85  C and 27  C, respectively. As can be
seen from the selected dataset, GNA model prediction shows a
considerable deviation when compared to the other three models.
On the other hand, DDt0 , MPR and ANN models show very close
agreement with experimental data. The discrepancy between the
model predictions and experimental data in the worst case is less
than 5%. Unfortunately, cross validation of the models with data
reported by other authors was not possible due to lack of
information.

Fig. 2. Comparison of the experimental data with the data obtained by simulation.

309

3.2.2. Comparison through statistical indicators

The goodness-of-t of a model is usually evaluated in terms of
statistical indicators. The statistical performance analysis of the
evaluated models was conducted including several statistical indicators: the residual sum of squares (SSres), the coefcient of
determination (R2), the root mean square error (RMSE) and the
coefcient of variation (CV).
The most common parameters to check how close the predicted
values are to observed data are the residual sum of squares and the
coefcient of determination. Residual is unexplained variation after
tting a model and is the difference between the value predicted by
the model and the associated observed value. The sum of squares of
these differences is called the residual sum of squares and can be
understood as a measure of the discrepancy between the data and
an estimation model. A smaller SSres indicates better t to the
observed data.
The coefcient of determination is another parameter which
quanties the goodness of t. The R2 can be calculated from the
residual sum of squares and the total sum of squares (SStot) by the
Eq. (10) and can be interpreted as a statistical measure of how well
a model prediction approximates the observed data.

R2 1 

SSres
SStot

(10)

An R2 of 1.0 would indicate that model prediction perfectly ts

the observed data. However, the statistical analysis cannot rely only
on R2, no matter how reasonable the t is. It should be interpreted
together with other indicators.
RMSE is used to obtain the condence interval (CI) which is a
way to visualize the precision of each model. Narrower CI indicates
better precision since RMSE is lower.
Normally, CI is constructed by using the standard deviation:

CI y  z$s

(11)

where y is the mean value of the measurement, s is the standard

deviation of the measurement, and z is the score of the standard
normal distribution. Using the RMSE instead of s and assuming a
condence level of 95% the CI can be estimated as:

CI Qk  1:96$RMSE

(12)

We also use the coefcient of variation of the root-mean-square

error (CV) in order to compare the models in terms of predicting
capabilities. CV is dened as RMSE divided by the dependent variable average (Eq. (13)).

CV

RMSE
$100%
Qk

(13)

The predicted cooling capacity and driving heat input using the
four models of the absorption chiller are compared in Fig. 3
applying the R2 and CI (in the form of dashed lines) indicators.
The comparison was performed using the entire experimental
database. The solid line represents the ideal match of the model
with experiment, while the dashed lines limit the 95% condence
area. A smaller distance between the two lines indicates a more
accurate prediction of the model. As it could be expected in this
gure is shown that much better accuracy is obtained by pure
black-box modeling methods.
GNA model shows the poorest performance, with the lowest R2,
0.9 in case of the cooling capacity and 0.83 in case of the generator
heat input, as illustrated in Fig. 3(a, e). Also, the widest CI range
among all the models clearly indicates that GNA has the lowest
accurate prediction. The other three methods (DDt0 , MPR and ANN)

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J. Labus et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 58 (2013) 305e313

Fig. 3. Comparison between the measured and predicted evaporator and generator loads-Pink.

had much better statistical indicators. Excellent t with the

observed data is visible through high coefcient of determination
(R2 w 0.99), while the narrow CIs indicate very accurate prediction
of all three modeling methods. Among them, the narrower CI
ranges and highest R2 values (>0.998) were obtained with the ANN
modeling method.
Another statistical indicator is the coefcient of variation (CV) of
the root mean square error. CV indicator is a normalized measure of
dispersion of the probability distribution and is dened as a percentage of the RMSE divided by the dependant variable mean
(Eq. (14)).

CV

RMSE
$100%
Qk

according to Hydeman et al. [28], the models with CV values in the

range of 3e5% are supposed to have good accuracy for performance
prediction in practical applications. The best CV indicators (<2%) in
this analysis were obtained by the ANN method.

(14)

The CV values for the different modeling methods are illustrated

in Fig. 4. If 10% deviation of CV is assumed to be acceptable to obtain
a satisfactory prediction, it is clear that the developed GNA model
cannot pass this threshold.
On the other hand, the calculated CV values of DDt0 , MPR and
ANN are lower than 5% which is more than satisfactory. Actually,

Fig. 4. CV values.

J. Labus et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 58 (2013) 305e313

Table 2
AICc and BIC analysis.
BIC

Criterion

AICc

Model

Q eva

Q ac

Q gen

Q eva

Q ac

Q gen

GNA
DDt
MPR
ANN

33.6
244.5
329.7
412.9

337.8
91.9
120.5
208.9

185.7
140.0
188.5
342.9

719.3
446.9
377.8
346.1

1023.5
596.6
587
550.1

871.4
548.5
519.0
416.0

3.2.3. Statistical tests

The selection of the best model using statistical indicators
could not be enough because what is meant by best is controversial. A good model selection technique should take into account not only goodness of t but also the simplicity of the
model. More complex models will be better able to adapt their
shape to t the data, but the additional parameters may not
represent anything useful. The statistical analysis usually used in
the case of nested models (when one model is a simpler case of
the other) is the extra sum of squares test (F-test). The F-test is
not appropriate for the comparison of non-nested models, which
is the case here. When comparing non-nested models there are
two criteria which can be used [29]: Akaikes Information Criterion (AIC) or Schwarz-Bayesian Information Criterion (BIC). The
AIC can be termed as a measure of the goodness of t of any
estimated statistical model. The BIC is a type of model selection
among a class of parametric models with different numbers of
parameters. The difference between AIC and BIC is that the
penalty term for the number of parameters in the model is larger
in BIC than in AIC. Both criteria were applied to compare the
analyzed absorption chiller models. The used AICc is a second
order AIC with a greater penalty for extra parameters and can be
calculated by using Eq. (15):

AICc N$ln



SSres
2K$K 1
2K
N
NK1

(15)

Similarly, BIC is dened by Eq. (16):

BIC N$lnSSres K$lnN

(16)

where N is the number of data points, K is the number of the model

parameters and SSres is the residual sum of squares. The interpretation of the results in both tests is the same: the model with lower
value is more likely to be selected. AICc and BIC analysis results of all
the models developed for the Pink absorption chiller are presented
in Table 2. The analysis also included the GNA model although it
could be discarded after the analysis performed with the statistical
indicators. The results of both AICc and BIC tests were in agreement
with the goodness of t results, recommending the most complex
model ANN to be adopted. Although the ANN model, which is a
complete black-box model, shows the closest t, other more
physically related models also could be applied, depending on the
specic application requirements (Table 2).

4. Conclusions
A comprehensive comparison of different methods for steadystate modeling of small capacity absorption chillers was presented in this paper. Four models were developed based on
experimental data. The models were based only on the measurements of the external water circuits. Statistical indicators such as R2
and CV showed that GNA model has the lowest predictive capacity.

311

Although the GNA model could not reproduce the chiller performance with high accuracy, it is still used in some cases due to its
simplicity. This is justied by a fact that on a whole year hourly
simulation, these deviations will most probably equal out to a great
extent. However, the statistical analysis indicates that would be
more appropriate to use one of the other three methods in order to
obtain better accuracy. Excellent statistical indicators (R2 around
0.99, CV lower than 5% and narrow CI) clearly show that any of the
three methods (DDt0 , MPR and ANN) is suitable for the performance
prediction of absorption systems, and could be used for the chiller
control and monitoring, fault detection or optimization. Nevertheless, the best prediction was obtained with the ANN method
with R2 > 0.998 and CV<2%. The comparison of the models with
AICc and BIC statistical tests conrmed that ANN was the most
suitable method to model the selected absorption chiller.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge nancial support of this
work by the CITYNET project funded via the Marie Curie Research
Training Network, the project TR 33049 funded by Serbian Ministry
of Education and Science and the project ENE2009-14182 funded
by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness.
Appendix
Two linear regression coefcients for the GNA model,

a1 36.524 and a2 41.527, were obtained after performing nu-

merical t of the experimental dataset.

Table A.1 shows the coefcients for characteristic functions of
absorption chiller obtained through multiple linear regression t
for the DDt method.

Table A.1
Estimated input parameters-DDt.

Q_ eva
Q_ ac
Q_

gen

s0

s0 a

s0 e

0.6822
1.2698
0.5662

1.0057
2.3951
1.3066

0.3801
1.0347
0.5947

1.6396
0
0

In the case of MPR models, Table A.2 shows the regression tting
parameters (bi,k) for the different heat loads (k) when a second
order polynomial t was applied on the experimental data of the
absorption chiller.
Table A.2
Fitting coefcients for MPR models.
(k)

Q_ eva

Q_ ac

Q_ gen

b0
b1
b2
b3
b4
b5
b6
b7
b8
b9

6.818
0.3703
1.4329
1.113
0.0122
0.0014
0.0076
0.0025
0.0081
0.0217

65.3225
0.3092
4.4372
0.2036
0.0159
0.0095
0.0117
0.0001
0.0146
0.0172

28.7061
0.5642
3.037
0.5002
0.0079
0.0048
0.0184
0.0019
0.0187
0.0009

Table A.3 shows the coefcients for the ANN modeling of the
absorption chiller obtained during the network training stage.

312

J. Labus et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 58 (2013) 305e313

Table A.3
ANN coefcients.
Input weights
IW Q_ eva
2.6842
26.2414
27.994
37.8786
4.5898
1.0661
0.4744
2.2865
2.0043
14.9552
3.0631
3.4876
0.6453
1.4337
Output weights
0.6507
LWQ_ eva
3.5228
LWQ_ ac
_
0.4252
LWQ gen
Biases in input layer
b1Q_ ac
b1Q_ eva
7.5266
2.1264
73.789
0.5695
2.7049
1.3703
3.5951
11.9184
33.3159
0.1494
1.984
9.4941
0.0916
3.7636

40.2259
151.8244
1.0163
7.902
27.8277
3.0904
0.9214

IW Q_ ac
1.3136
1.6348
3.1738
3.85
0.6074
1.0057
0.2914

0.4582
3.8286
18.2436

1.1899
1.8483
0.4097

b1Q_ gen
22.9476
1.0747
1.3844
2.0647
3.6732
10.9156
5.1815

b2Q_ eva
6.993

4.368
3.5549
0.4494
1.5356
1.2485
11.3297
0.8686

1.0693
0.616
0.8719
27.8663
9.6199
0.3298
Biases in hidden layer
b2Q_ ac
b2Q_ gen
23.9447
12.8346

Nomenclature

a
b
3

b1, b2
A
CL
COP
I
IW, LW
J:
Q
R
R2
RMSE
SS
T

2.9482
6.8414
3.5448
7.2797
0.0293
5.0261
6.4158

GNA regression coefcient

MPR coefcient
efciency
bias
heat transfer areas [m2]
condence limits
coefcient of performance [-]
input variable
matrix weights
number of neurons in the hidden layer
heat ow [kW]
number of neurons in the input layer
coefcient of determination
root mean square error
sum of squares
temperature [ C]

Sub-index
ac
absorber/condenser
eva
evaporator
gen
generator
in
input
k
absorber/condenser, evaporator or generator thermal
load
out
output
res
residual
shx
solution heat exchanger
tot
total
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