\

PERGAMON

Renewable Energy 07 "0888# 7688

Arti_cial neural networks used for the

performance prediction of a thermosiphon solar
water heater
Soteris A[ Kalogiroua\\ So_a Pantelioub\ Argiris Dentsorasb
a

Department of Mechanical and Marine En`ineerin`\ Hi`her Technical Institute\ P[O[ Box 19312\
Nicosia 1041\ Cyprus
b
Machine Desi`n Laboratory\ Department of Mechanical En`ineerin` and Aeronautics\
University of Patras\ 15499 Patras\ Greece
Received 07 June 0887^ accepted 8 October 0887

Abstract
Arti_cial Neural Networks "ANN# are widely accepted as a technology o}ering an alternative
way to tackle complex and ill!de_ned problems[ They can learn from examples\ are fault
tolerant\ are able to deal with non!linear problems\ and once trained can perform prediction
at high speed[ ANNs have been used in diverse applications and they have shown to be
particularly e}ective in system modelling as well as for system identi_cation[ The objective of
this work is to train an arti_cial neural network "ANN# to learn to predict the performance of
a thermosiphon solar domestic water heating system[ This performance is measured in terms
of the useful energy extracted and of the stored water temperature rise[ An ANN has been
trained using performance data for four types of systems\ all employing the same collector
panel under varying weather conditions[ In this way the network was trained to accept and
handle a number of unusual cases[ The data presented as input were\ the storage tank heat loss
coe.cient "U!value#\ the type of system "open or closed#\ the storage volume\ and a total of
_fty!four readings from real experiments of total daily solar radiation\ total daily di}use
radiation\ ambient air temperature\ and the water temperature in storage tank at the beginning
of the day[ The network output is the useful energy extracted from the system and the water
temperature rise[ The statistical coe.cient of multiple determination "R1!value# obtained for
the training data set was equal to 9[8803 and 9[8797 for the two output parameters respectively[
Both values are satisfactory because the closer R1!value is to unity the better is the mapping[
Unknown data for all four systems were subsequently used to investigate the accuracy of
prediction[ These include performance data for the systems considered for the training of the
network at di}erent weather conditions[ Predictions with maximum deviations of 0 MJ and
1[1>C were obtained respectively[ Random data were also used both with the performance

 Corresponding author[ Tel[] 99 246 1 295088^ fax] 99 246 1 383842^ e!mail] skalogirspidernet[com[cy
9859!0370:88:, ! see front matter 0888 Elsevier Science Ltd[ All rights reserved
PII] S 9 8 5 9 ! 0 3 7 0 " 8 7 # 9 9 6 7 6 ! 2

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equations obtained from the experimental measurements and with the arti_cial neural net!
work to predict the above two parameters[ The predicted values thus obtained were very com!
parable[ These results indicate that the proposed method can successfully be used for the
estimation of the performance of the particular thermosiphon system at any of the di}erent
types of con_guration used here[ The greatest advantage of the present model is the capacity
of the network to learn from examples and thus gradually improve its performance[ This is
done by embedding experimental knowledge in the network[ 0888 Elsevier Science Ltd[ All
rights reserved[

0[ Introduction
Two of the most important parameters of a solar water heating system that need
to be determined accurately are the estimation of the system useful energy gain and
the water temperature rise at the end of a solar energy collection period[ A number
of commercial software programmes are currently available for the estimation of the
useful heat collected from a solar water heating system "e[g[ TRNSYS\ Watsun\ T!
sol\ etc[#[ Temperature rise of the water contained in the storage tank is not usually
estimated[ Instead the solar contribution or f!factor is calculated\ i[e[\ the ratio of the
collected heat to the total heat requirements of a system[ There programs basically
consider hourly values of solar radiation\ ambient air temperature\ wind speed and
relative humidity\ taken from typical meteorological year "TMY# _les\ to perform
calculations using systems of complicated di}erential equations[ In the present work
the actual energy that the system is able to provide during draw!o} is considered to
be the useful energy extracted from the system[
Commercial system modelling programs are generally time!consuming\ especially
when it comes to providing annual results[ Furthermore the cost of these programs
could be prohibitively high for small research establishments[ There is therefore\ a
need for alternative approaches to this task[ The recently developed technology of
arti_cial neural networks "ANN# could o}er such an alternative approach[
Neural networks are widely accepted as a technology o}ering an alternative way
to tackle complex and ill!de_ned problems[ They can learn from examples\ are fault
tolerant in the sense that they are able to handle noisy and incomplete data\ are able
to deal with non!linear problems\ and once trained can perform prediction at very
high speed[ The power of neural networks in modelling complex mappings and
in system identi_cation has been demonstrated 02[ This work encouraged many
researchers to explore the possibility of using neural network models in real world
applications such as in control systems\ in classi_cation\ and modelling complex
process transformations 37[
Arti_cial neural networks have been used successfully to model a solar steam
generator[ In particular they have been used to model the collector intercept factor
8\ the local concentration ratios around the periphery of the collector receiver 09\
and the starting!up of the system 00[ This was a complex problem since the system

S[A[ Kalo`irou et al[ : Renewable Ener`y 07 "0888# 7688

78

was modelled during its heat!up\ i[e[\ under transient conditions[ Also arti_cial neural
networks have been used for the same system to predict the mean monthly steam
production with an error con_ned to less than 4[0) 01[
The aim of this study is to investigate the suitability of neural networks as tools for
the estimation of the performance of a solar water heating system[ The estimated
parameters\ i[e[\ the useful energy extracted by the system and the stored water
temperature rise in the storage tank\ are considered as the most important\ both to a
system designer and to the end user of the system[ It is also required to use simple
and easily measurable system and environmental data such as total daily and di}use
radiation and mean air temperature[ This would facilitate the work of design engineers
in the _eld[

1[ Arti_cial neural networks

Arti_cial neural networks "ANNs# are systems of weight vectors\ whose component
values are established through various machine!learning algorithms\ which take as
input a linear set of pattern inputs and produce as output a numerical pattern
representing the actual system output[
Arti_cial neural networks mimic somewhat the learning process of a human brain[
Instead of complex rules and mathematical routines\ ANNs are able to learn the key
information patterns within a multi!dimensional information domain[ In addition\
the inherently noisy data do not seem to cause a problem\ since they are neglected[
ANN models represent a new method in system prediction[ ANNs operate like a
{black box| model and do not require detailed information about the system[ Instead\
they learn the relationship between the input parameters and the controlled and
uncontrolled variables by studying previously recorded data\ similar to the way a
non!linear regression might perform[ Another advantage of using ANNs is their
ability to handle large and complex systems with many interrelated parameters[ They
seem to simply ignore excess data that are of minimal signi_cance and concentrate
instead on the more important inputs[
Arti_cial neural networks di}er from traditional simulation approaches in that
they are trained to learn solutions rather than being programmed to model a speci_c
problem in the normal way[ They are used to address problems that are intractable
or cumbersome to solve with traditional methods[ A neural network consists of a
number of processing elements "neurons#\ each of which have many inputs but only
one output[ In a typical network there are three layers of neurons\ i[e[\ input layer
which receives input from the outside world\ hidden layer or layers which receive
inputs from the input layer neurons and the output layer which receives inputs from
the hidden layers and passes its output to the outside world and in some cases back
to the preceding layers[ The strength of the network lies in the interconnections
between the neurons\ which is modi_ed during training[ The training is done by
exposing the network to a speci_c data set of information and by applying a training
algorithm to enable the network to produce the desired output[

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A neural network is a non!linear mapping of the space between the input and the
output data sets and consists of three parts*an input vector "independent variables#\
an output vector "dependent variables#\ and an algorithm that maps the input space
to the output space[ This algorithm is related only to neural networks and should not
be confused with any other algorithm used in modelling of solar systems[ One or
more hidden layers connect the external layers by a set of {weights|\ expressed as two!
dimensional matrices\ wij[ In a feed!forward neural network\ the value of each node
in a particular hidden layer is the result of a non!linear transfer function a whose
argument is the weighted sum over all the nodes in the previous layer plus a constant
term b0 which is referred to as the bias]
bi  s wijapjb0

"0#

The j subscript refers to a summation of all nodes in the previous layer of nodes and
the i subscript refers to the node position in the present layer[ The p subscript indicates
the input pattern[ In order to solve for the weight and bias values of Eq[ "0# for all
nodes\ one requires a set of input patterns\ representative of the system behaviour[
This set of examples is used in an iterative fashion to establish weight values using a
gradient descent algorithm known as back!propagation[
A variety of training algorithms are available but in general\ to train a network\
one begins with a set of training data consisting of the input vector\ and corresponding
target vector[ The internal weights are adjusted until the sum of di}erences between
the neural network outputs and the corresponding target is minimised to a pre!
determined level for all the training data[
A sigmoidal function is usually used for the transfer function as it enables a _nite
number of nodes in a single hidden layer to uniformly approximate any continuous
function]
a"pi# 

0
0ebi

"1#

A schematic diagram of a typical three!layer feed!forward neural network architecture

is shown in Fig[ 0[ The network usually consists of an input layer\ one hidden layer
and an output layer[ In its simple form\ each single neuron is connected to other
neurons of a previous layer through adaptable synaptic weights[ Knowledge is usually
stored as a set of connection weights "presumably corresponding to synapses in
biological neural systems#[ Training is the process of modifying the connection weights
in some orderly fashion using a learning method[ The network uses a learning
procedure\ in which an input is presented to the network along with the desired output
and the weights are adjusted so that the network attempts to produce the desired
output[ The weights after training contain meaningful information whereas before
training the random weights have no meaning[
Training of the network was performed using back!propagation algorithm[ This
algorithm iteratively adjusts the weights to reduce the error between the actual and
the desired outputs of the network[ The back!propagation and its variants 02\ 03

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80

Fig[ 0[ Schematic diagram of a multi!layer feed!forward neural network[

are the most popular learning algorithms[ A training set is a group of matched input
and output patterns used for training the network\ usually by suitable adaptation of
the synaptic weights[ The outputs are the dependent variables that the network
produces for the corresponding input[ It is important that all the information the
network needs to learn is supplied to the network as a data set[ When each pattern is
read\ the network uses the input data to produce an output\ which is then compared
to the training pattern\ i[e[\ the correct or desired output[ If there is a di}erence\ the
connection weights "usually but not always# are altered in such a direction that the
error is decreased[ After the network has run through all the input patterns\ if the
error is still greater than the maximum desired tolerance\ the ANN runs again through
all the input patterns repeatedly until all the errors are within the required tolerance[
When the training reaches a satisfactory level\ the network holds the weights constant
and uses the trained network to make predictions of the output parameters in new
input data sets not used to train it[

2[ Description of solar systems

The thermosiphonic solar water heating system consists of one ~at!plate solar
collector panel of total aperture area equal to 1[97 m1 and a horizontal hot water
storage tank[ The panel comprises 05 riser pipes 8[4 mm in diameter each[ A total of
four di}erent systems\ all _tted with the same collector panel\ have been considered[
Three of them are operated as open thermosiphonic systems and one as closed
thermosiphonic[ The capacity of the storage tank varies from 014 to 199 litres[ The
system characteristics are shown in Table 0[

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Table 0
Physical characteristics of the systems used to train the network
System

U!value0 "W:m1K#

System type1

Storage capacity "L#

0
1
2
3

1[01
1[19
1[30
1[61

0
1
0
0

014
049
049
199

U!value  mean storage tank heat loss coe.cient with the collector connected to the system[
System type] 0*open^ 1*closed[
Collector area in all cases  1[97 m1[
Storage tank in all cases is horizontal[

For this type of system the useful energy collected\ Qout\ may be obtained from the
following Eqn[
Qout  a0Ha1"Ta"av#Tc#a2

"2#

Similarly the stored water temperature rise\ Td!max is]

Td!maxTc  b0Hb1"Ta"av#Tc#b2

"3#

where a0\ a1\ a2\ b0\ b1\ and b2 are constants[

H solar irradiation at collector aperture "MJ:m1#
Ta"av# mean ambient air temperature ">C#
Tc mean cold water temperature ">C#
By performing a series of experiments at di}erent weather conditions\ the constants
of Eqs[ "2# and "3# can be evaluated[ For the systems under consideration these
constants are shown in Table 1[

3[ Collection of data
For the training of an arti_cial neural network\ data from 43 performance tests
were used[ These consist of 03 sets of experimental measurements for systems\ 0\ 2\

Table 1
Constants of the systems considered required for Eqs[ 2 and 3
System

a0

a1

a2

b0

b1

b2

0
1
2
3

0[900
0[960
0[945
0[988

9[244
9[265
9[249
9[368

9[001
9[098
9[542
9[034

0[65
0[69
0[53
0[31

9[33
9[49
9[34
9[23

0[99
0[29
0[09
9[07

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and 3 and 01 sets for system 1[ The reason for using less data for system 1 is because
for this system only 03 sets of experimental measurements were available and the two
were left behind for testing the network[ All these were collected from tests carried
out according to the Greek standard ELOT 768 for systems available to the Greek
market 04[ The network was trained using a large spectrum of weather conditions[
These varied from total solar radiation between 4 and 13[4 MJ:m1 and di}use solar
radiation between 0[7 and 00[8 MJ:m1[ This variety of data was thought necessary
for enabling the ANN to learn a large spectrum of cases[
In order to facilitate the work of designers\ it is desirable to reduce the number of
data required for calculations[ The data used for the training of the network\ are
those that mostly a}ect the performance of the system and are easily obtainable[
These include the physical characteristics of the systems\ the weather conditions\ and
the required output[ The physical characteristics of the various systems considered
are shown in Table 0[ The most di.cult parameter to determine is the heat loss
coe.cient\ which needs experimental testing of the system in a suitable laboratory[ A
sample of the weather data and system performance parameters considered for system
number 0 is shown in Table 2[ It may be observed that wind speed and relative
humidity have not been explicitly taken into account[ This is due to the fact that the
system output values of useful energy gain and stored water temperature rise\
inherently include these parameters and are indirectly taken into account by the
network[

Table 2
Weather conditions and system performance data for system number 0 used for the training of the network
Weather conditions

System performance

Total radiation
at collector
aperture
H
MJ:m1

Di}use radiation
at collector
aperture
Hd
MJ:m1

Mean
ambient air
temperature
Ta"av#
>C

Mean cold
water
temperature
Tc
>C

Useful energy
extracted
from system
Qout
MJ

Water
temperature
rise
Td!max
>C

09[39
08[23
10[79
11[86
10[23
13[79
13[43
14[11
10[69
01[72
7[36
7[56
01[37
06[64

4[84
2[69
1[60
1[70
00[81
1[50
1[73
8[03
7[25
8[37
5[02
7[36
8[32
7[46

00[2
7[2
8[1
02[9
04[2
05[5
04[4
01[1
6[8
01[8
4[8
05[5
06[0
06[3

00[3
00[0
00[1
00[0
00[8
00[4
00[3
00[4
01[9
04[8
00[5
03[7
04[1
02[7

09[15
07[85
12[51
12[42
12[51
15[89
15[59
12[95
08[32
09[35
5[58
7[21
01[99
19[03

21[9
35[5
41[9
43[9
42[0
41[6
48[9
46[0
36[0
24[1
12[8
18[8
28[2
36[8

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All the systems were tested in Athens\ Greece "27>\ north latitude# and therefore all
the input parameters refer to that location[ As ~at plate collectors are not very
sensitive to the geographic latitude of the location and as ANN are able to generalise\
it is believed by the authors that such a model could give predictions for systems
located at the greatest Hellenic area[

4[ Arti_cial neural network model

Various network architectures have been investigated aiming at _nding the one
that could result in the best overall performance[ The architecture\ from those tested\
that gave the best results and _nally adopted is similar to the one shown in Fig[ 0 and
is shown descriptively in Fig[ 1[ This architecture has one hidden slab employing the
sigmoid activation function[ The input slab activation function was linear\ and the
activation in the output slab was also sigmoid[ The network employs twenty!four
neurons in the hidden slab[ An increased number of hidden neurons have been used
in order to get more {degrees of freedom| and allow the network to store more complex
patterns[ In fact the same architecture with a smaller number of neurons in the hidden
layer could not achieve an acceptable mapping[ This is because the input data were
highly non!linear[ Seven input neurons have been used\ corresponding to the values
shown in Fig[ 1\ for a seven!element input vector of the training data set[ The output
is a two!element vector corresponding to the values of the useful energy extracted
from the system and the stored water temperature rise[ The back!propagation learning
algorithm has been used[ The network gain was set to 9[5 and the momentum factor
to 9[8[ A total of 43 patterns have been collected for the four solar domestic water
heating "SDWH# systems as described above[ From this set 35 patterns were used for
the training of the network while the remaining eight were randomly selected to be
used as test patterns[

Fig[ 1[ Neural network architecture employed[

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The training was stopped when the minimum average error of the test data set was
equal to 9[99092[ This error remained constant for a total of 199\999 events\ i[e[\
about 3249 iterations through all data in the training data set[ This is considered a
good value\ enabling the network to give good predictions and avoiding overtraining[
The training data were learned with an excellent accuracy with coe.cients of
multiple determination "R1!values# of 9[8803 and 9[8797 corresponding to the values
of the useful energy extracted from the system and the stored water temperature rise
respectively[ This coe.cient determines the accuracy of the model[ The fact that both
values are close to unity indicates that the mapping was performed at a satisfactory
level[

5[ Results and validation

Once a satisfactory degree of inputoutput mapping has been reached\ the network
training is stopped and the set of completely unknown test data is applied for veri!
_cation[ The validation data set\ shown in Table 3 comprises data of the four systems
considered for training the network but at di}erent weather conditions[ These com!
prise data for days with low and high total radiation\ some of which have low\ and
some high di}use components[ This variety of data was used in order to investigate
the robustness of the neural network to make predictions in a variety of weather

Table 3
Validation data set
System

H "MJ:m1#

Hd "MJ:m1# Ta"av# ">C#

Tc ">C#

Qout "MJ#

Td!max ">C#

00[99
12[76
13[08
3[42
14[35

09[56
2[19
2[68
3[42
2[53

19[6
01[9
05[6
4[7
02[2

04[5
00[3
01[3
00[6
01[1

01[56
13[59
14[73
2[17
14[23

39[1
45[6
48[2
06[5
46[6

7[87
08[47

6[55
4[03

06[1
19[2

07[7
07[5

7[77
19[82

23[3
41[6

7[36
13[79
08[40
10[33
05[87

5[02
1[50
5[73
6[01
6[72

4[8
05[5
02[5
05[5
09[6

00[5
00[4
05[0
05[0
00[9

6[61
17[39
19[80
11[27
07[68

12[1
45[5
38[9
40[9
30[0

08[23
09[39
11[94
7[36
12[20

2[69
4[84
5[47
5[02
4[08

7[2
00[2
19[7
4[8
13[9

00[0
00[3
05[3
00[4
06[2

19[69
09[02
15[93
5[12
17[65

28[9
16[4
37[2
10[2
41[2

Note] For explanations of symbols refer to Tables 0 and 1[

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conditions[ A comparison of the predicted results with the actual experimental values
for the useful energy extracted from the system and the stored water temperature rise
is shown in Tables 4 and 5 respectively[ The maximum deviation between the actual
and the predicted values for the useful energy extracted is 0 MJ and for the stored
water temperature rise is 1[1>C[ Both values are considered adequately accurate for
design purposes[ It should be emphasised that the training of the network required
about 3 min on a Pentium 022 MHz machine[ The subsequent predictions for the
unknown cases require about 01 s on the same machine^ thus the estimation time
was reduced drastically without sacri_cing accuracy[
It can be seen from these Tables that both the predictions of the useful energy
extracted from the systems and the stored water temperature rise were performed
with adequate accuracy[ The cases shown in Tables 4 and 5 are speci_cally selected
to show the range of accuracy obtained and in particular the minimum and maximum
deviations[
One case which is of particular interest is the one shown in Table 3 at the fourth
row for system number 0[ The data refer to a completely overcast day "with only 3[42
MJ:m1 all di}use radiation# and a very low ambient temperature "4[7>C#[ As can be
seen in Tables 3 and 4\ the neural network was able to give good predictions even for
this unusual case[

Table 4
Comparison between actual and predicted values of the useful energy extracted

Actual Qout
"MJ#

ANN predicted Qout

"MJ#

Absolute di}erence between actual

and predicted values
"MJ#

01[56
13[59
14[73
2[17
14[23

01[09
14[96
15[09
2[59
14[78

9[46
9[36
9[15
9[21
9[44

7[77
19[82

7[46
10[61

9[20
9[68

6[61
17[39
19[80
11[27
07[68

6[42
17[86
19[08
12[30
07[42

9[08
9[46
9[61
0[92
9[15

19[69
09[02
15[93
5[12
17[65

10[92
09[40
15[36
5[66
17[84

9[22
9[27
9[32
9[43
9[08

System

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86

Table 5
Comparison between actual and predicted values for the stored water temperature rise
Actual
temperature
">C#

ANN predicted
temperature
">C#

Absolute di}erence between

actual and predicted values
">C#

39[1
45[6
48[2
06[5
46[6

39[7
44[0
46[0
08[7
45[5

9[5
0[5
1[1
1[1
0[0

23[3
41[6

21[1
42[3

1[1
9[6

12[1
45[5
38[9
40[9
30[0

11[0
44[6
35[7
49[7
39[3

0[0
9[8
1[1
9[1
9[6

28[9
16[4
37[2
10[2
41[2

27[2
14[6
37[5
19[9
41[5

9[6
0[7
9[2
0[2
9[2

System

In addition to the validation procedure shown above\ random values were used
both in Eqs[ 2 and 3 and to the network\ in order to investigate the accuracy of the
neural network model[ The random values represent days with very low and very
high total and di}use radiation and a wide range of ambient and water temperatures[
The results are shown graphically for the two performance parameters investigated in
Figs[ 2 and 3 respectively[ In all cases\ the marks indicating the predicted performance
according to Eqs[ 2 or 3 and the neural network are very close[ It can therefore be

Fig[ 2[ Comparison of predictions with Eq[ "2# and ANN for the useful energy extracted from the system[

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Fig[ 3[ Comparison of predictions with Eq[ "3# and ANN for the stored water temperature rise[

concluded that by performing a small number of experiments and by using the data
to train a suitable network\ one can produce a model of the system\ which can be
used to predict the performance of the system under any weather conditions[

6[ Conclusions
The objective of this work was to train an arti_cial neural network "ANN# to learn
to predict thermosiphonic solar domestic water heating "SDWH# systems useful
energy extracted and stored water temperature rise with the minimum of input data[
Once trained\ the network estimates both parameters very fast "01 s#[ The statistical
R1!value obtained for the training data set was equal to 9[8803 and 9[8797 for the two
performance parameters respectively[ Both values are considered to be satisfactory
because the closer R1!value is to unity the better is the mapping[ The validation of the
network was performed with unknown data\ which the network has not seen before[
These include systems considered for the training of the network at di}erent weather
conditions[ Predictions with maximum deviations of 0 MJ and 1[1>C were obtained
respectively[ Random data were also used both with the performance equations
obtained from the experimental measurements and with the arti_cial neural network
to predict the above two parameters[ The predicted valves thus obtained were very
comparable[
It can therefore be concluded that it is possible to train a suitable neural network
to model a thermosiphonic solar domestic water heating system\ which can be used
to predict the performance of the system under any weather conditions[ Training data
for the network can be obtained by performing a small number of experiments during
which the weather conditions outlined in this paper can be recorded together to some
physical parameters of the system[
The advantages of this approach compared to the conventional algorithmic
methods are "i# the speed of calculation\ "ii# the simplicity\ and "iii# the capacity of
the network to learn from examples and thus gradually improve its potential and
performance[ This is done by embedding experimental knowledge in the network[
Additionally\ actual weather data have been used for the training of the network\

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88

which leads to more realistic results as compared to other modelling programs\ which
rely on TMY data\ which are not necessarily similar to the actual environment in
which a system operates[

References
0 Kohonen T[ Self!Organisation and Associative Memories[ Berlin!Verlag\ 0873[
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