Patents by Inventor Michael J. Wenzel

Michael J. Wenzel has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Publication number: 20210209532
    Abstract: A controller for a system of equipment that operate to produce or consume one or more resources includes one or more processing circuits configured to generate a resource balance constraint using a balance between a first amount of each resource and a second amount of each resource. The first amount of each resource includes at least an amount of the resource produced by the equipment. The second amount of each resource includes at least an amount of the resource consumed by the equipment. The one or more processing circuits are configured to perform a control process using the resource balance constraint to determine amounts of each resource to be produced or consumed by the equipment and operate the equipment to produce or consume the amounts of each resource determined by the control process.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 22, 2021
    Publication date: July 8, 2021
    Applicant: Johnson Controls Technology Company
    Inventors: Michael J. Wenzel, Matthew J. Ellis
  • Publication number: 20210208547
    Abstract: A method for controlling equipment includes grouping a plurality of granular assets to form one or more general assets and generating models of the general assets based on the granular assets that form the general assets. Each model corresponds to a general asset and defines a relationship between resources produced by the general asset and resources consumed by the general asset. The method includes performing a first control process using the models of the general assets to determine a first allocation of resources among the general assets. The first allocation defines amounts of the resources to be consumed, produced, or stored by each of the general assets. The method includes operating the equipment to consume, produce, or store the resources in accordance with the first allocation.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 18, 2021
    Publication date: July 8, 2021
    Applicant: Johnson Controls Technology Company
    Inventors: John H. Burroughs, Andrew J. Przybylski, Michael J. Wenzel, Matthew J. Ellis
  • Publication number: 20210192469
    Abstract: A controller for performing a peer analysis of a predictive model for a building including processors and non-transitory computer-readable media storing instructions that, when executed by the processors, cause the processors to perform operations. The operations include comparing model parameters of a set of predictive models corresponding to a set of building zones, the model parameters indicating system dynamics of the building zones, to determine whether any of the building zones are exhibiting abnormal system dynamics. The operations include initiating a corrective action in response to determining that at least one of the building zones is exhibiting abnormal system dynamics.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 18, 2019
    Publication date: June 24, 2021
    Applicant: Johnson Controls Technology Company
    Inventors: ROBERT D. TURNEY, MICHAEL J. WENZEL, MOHAMMAD N. ELBSAT, ANAS W. I. ALANQAR
  • Publication number: 20210190349
    Abstract: A controller for operating building equipment of a building. The controller includes one or more processors. The controller includes one or more non-transitory computer-readable media storing instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations. The operations include comparing one or more model parameters of predictive models describing zones of the building to determine one or more zone groups for the building. The operations include generating one or more zone group models corresponding to the one or more zone groups. The operations include operating the building equipment using the one or more zone group models to affect a variable state or condition of the building.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 18, 2019
    Publication date: June 24, 2021
    Applicant: Johnson Controls Technology Company
    Inventors: ROBERT D. TURNEY, MICHAEL J. WENZEL, MOHAMMAD N. ELBSAT, ANAS W. I. ALANQAR, JOHN H. BURROUGHS, ANDREW J. PRZYBYLSKI
  • Publication number: 20210173366
    Abstract: An environmental control system of a building including a first building device operable to affect environmental conditions of a zone of the building by providing a first input to the zone. The system includes a second building device operable to independently affect a subset of the environmental conditions by providing a second input to the zone and further includes a controller including a processing circuit. The processing circuit is configured to perform an optimization to generate control decisions for the building devices. The optimization is performed subject to constraints for the environmental conditions and uses a predictive model that predicts an effect of the control decisions on the environmental conditions. The processing circuit is configured to operate the building devices in accordance with the control decisions.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 4, 2019
    Publication date: June 10, 2021
    Inventors: ROBERT D. TURNEY, MICHAEL J. WENZEL, MOHAMMAD N. ELBSAT, LIMING YANG, MATTHEW J. ELLIS, MASAYUKI NONAKA
  • Publication number: 20210175713
    Abstract: An electrical energy storage system includes a battery configured to store and discharge electric power to an energy grid, a power inverter configured to use battery power setpoints to control an amount of the electric power stored or discharged from the battery, the battery power setpoints comprising at least one of frequency regulation power setpoints and ramp rate control power setpoints, and a controller. The controller is configured to use a battery life model to generate the battery power setpoints for the power inverter. The battery life model includes one or more variables that depend on the battery power setpoints.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 30, 2020
    Publication date: June 10, 2021
    Inventors: Michael J. Wenzel, Brett M. Lenhardt, Kirk H. Drees
  • Patent number: 11022947
    Abstract: An energy optimization system for a building includes a processing circuit configured to generate a user interface including an indication of one or more economic load demand response (ELDR) operation parameters, one or more first participation hours, and a first load reduction amount for each of the one or more first participation hours. The processing circuit is configured to receive one or more overrides of the one or more first participation hours from the user interface, generate one or more second participation hours, a second load reduction amount for each of the one or more second participation hours, and one or more second equipment loads for the one or more pieces of building equipment based on the received one or more overrides, and operate the one or more pieces of building equipment to affect an environmental condition of the building based on the one or more second equipment loads.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 8, 2018
    Date of Patent: June 1, 2021
    Assignee: Johnson Controls Technology Company
    Inventors: Mohammad N. ElBsat, Michael J. Wenzel, Nicole A. Madison, Tricia J. Valentine, Collin W. Eggert, Matthew J. Asmus, James P. Kummer, Carol T. Tumey, Peter A. Craig
  • Publication number: 20210158975
    Abstract: A smart edge controller for building equipment that operates to affect a variable state or condition within a building. The controller includes processors and non-transitory computer-readable media storing instructions that, when executed by the processors, cause the processors to perform operations including obtaining sensor data indicating environmental conditions of the building and include determining an amount of available processing resources at the smart edge controller or at the building equipment. The operations include automatically scaling a level of complexity of an optimization of a cost function based on the available processing resources and include performing the optimization of the cost function at the automatically scaled level of complexity to generate a first setpoint trajectory. The first setpoint trajectory includes operating setpoints for the building equipment at time steps within an optimization period.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 26, 2019
    Publication date: May 27, 2021
    Applicant: Johnson Controls Technology Company
    Inventors: Robert D. Turney, Serdar Suindykov, Mohammad N. ELBSAT, Michael J. Wenzel
  • Publication number: 20210148592
    Abstract: A building cooling system includes one or more cooling devices operable to affect an indoor air temperature of a building and a system management circuit. The system management circuit is configured to obtain an objective function that includes a power consumption term and a comfort term, perform an optimization of the objective function over a time horizon to determine values of the cooling capacity of the cooling devices where each value of the cooling capacity corresponds to a time step of the time horizon, and control the cooling devices based on the values of the cooling capacity of the cooling devices. The comfort term of the objective function a difference between a prediction of the indoor air temperature of the building and a temperature setpoint for the building, while the power consumption term is a function of the power consumption of the one or more cooling devices.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 18, 2019
    Publication date: May 20, 2021
    Applicant: Johnson Controls Technology Company
    Inventors: Robert D. Turney, Liming Yang, Michael J. Wenzel
  • Patent number: 11009251
    Abstract: A frequency response optimization system includes a battery configured to store and discharge electric power, a power inverter configured to control an amount of the electric power stored or discharged from the battery at each of a plurality of time steps during a frequency response period, and a frequency response controller. The frequency response controller is configured to receive a regulation signal from an incentive provider, determine statistics of the regulation signal, use the statistics of the regulation signal to generate an optimal frequency response midpoint that achieves a desired change in a state-of-charge (SOC) of the battery while participating in a frequency response program, and use the midpoints to determine optimal battery power setpoints for the power inverter. The power inverter is configured to use the optimal battery power setpoints to control the amount of the electric power stored or discharged from the battery.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 17, 2020
    Date of Patent: May 18, 2021
    Assignee: Con Edison Battery Storage, LLC
    Inventors: Michael J. Wenzel, Kirk H. Drees, Mohammad N. Elbsat
  • Patent number: 11010846
    Abstract: A building energy system includes a controller configured to obtain representative loads and rates for a plurality of scenarios and generate a cost function comprising a risk attribute and multiple demand charges. Each of the demand charges corresponds to a demand charge period and defines a cost based on a maximum amount of at least one of the energy resources purchased within the corresponding demand charge period. The controller is configured to determine, for each of the multiple demand charges, a peak demand target for the corresponding demand charge period by performing a first optimization of the risk attribute over the plurality of the scenarios, allocate an amount of the one or more energy resources to be consumed, produced, stored, or discharged by the building equipment by performing a second optimization subject to one or more constraints based on the peak demand target for each of the multiple demand charges.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 13, 2019
    Date of Patent: May 18, 2021
    Assignee: Johnson Controls Technology Company
    Inventors: Mohammad N. ElBsat, Michael J. Wenzel, Robert D. Turney
  • Publication number: 20210141346
    Abstract: A controller for operating building equipment of a building including processors and non-transitory computer-readable media storing instructions that, when executed by the processors, cause the processors to perform operations including obtaining a first setpoint trajectory from a cloud computation system. The first setpoint trajectory includes setpoints for the building equipment or for a space of the building. The setpoints correspond to time steps of an optimization period. The operations include determining whether a connection between the controller and the cloud computation system is active or inactive at a time step of the optimization period and determining an active setpoint for the time step of the optimization period using either the first or second setpoint trajectory based on whether the connection between the controller and the cloud computation system is active or inactive at the time step. The operations include operating the building equipment based on the active setpoint.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 12, 2019
    Publication date: May 13, 2021
    Inventors: Michael J. Wenzel, Robert D. Turney, Jiaqi Li, Matthew J. Ellis, Mohammad N. ELBSAT
  • Publication number: 20210132586
    Abstract: A controller for equipment that operate to provide heating or cooling to a building or campus includes a processing circuit configured to obtain utility rate data indicating a price of resources consumed by the equipment to serve energy loads of the building or campus, obtain an objective function that expresses a total monetary cost of operating the equipment over an optimization period as a function of the utility rate data and an amount of the resources consumed by the equipment, determine a relationship between resource consumption and load production of the equipment, optimize the objective function over the optimization subject to a constraint based on the relationship between the resource consumption and the load production of the equipment to determine a distribution of the load production across the equipment, and operate the equipment to achieve the distribution.
    Type: Application
    Filed: January 13, 2021
    Publication date: May 6, 2021
    Applicant: Johnson Controls Technology Company
    Inventors: Michael J. Wenzel, Robert D. Turney, Kirk H. Drees, Matthew J. Asmus
  • Publication number: 20210104893
    Abstract: An optimization controller for a battery includes a high level controller configured to receive a regulation signal from an incentive provider cat a data fusion module, determine statistics of the regulation signal, and use the statistics of the regulation signal to generate a frequency response midpoint. The optimization controller further includes a low level controller configured to use the frequency response midpoint to determine optimal battery power setpoints and use the optimal battery power setpoints to control an amount of electric power stored or discharged from the battery during a frequency response period.
    Type: Application
    Filed: September 15, 2020
    Publication date: April 8, 2021
    Inventors: Radu Dorneanu, Michael J. Wenzel, Mohammad N. Elbsat, Kirk H. Drees, Andrew J. Przybylski
  • Patent number: 10962251
    Abstract: An air conditioner controller for an air conditioner is configured to obtain a first value of a performance value from a predetermined component of the air conditioner, and estimate a total cost. The controller is configured to estimate the total cost including an operation cost and a renewal cost of the air conditioner based on the first value of the performance variable obtained from the predetermined component of the air conditioner and a second value of the performance variable estimated by an operational model of the air conditioner. The total cost is a total cost of operating and renewing the air conditioner for a time period after a time at which the first value of the performance variable is obtained. The controller is configured to output the total cost via a user interface.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 6, 2019
    Date of Patent: March 30, 2021
    Assignee: Hitachi-Johnson Controls Air Conditioning, Inc.
    Inventors: Yasutaka Yoshida, Koji Naito, Hayato Mori, Robert D. Turney, Mohammad N. ElBsat, Michael J. Wenzel
  • Patent number: 10956842
    Abstract: A controller for central plant equipment obtains a model of one or more sources configured to supply input resources, one or more subplants configured to convert the input resources to output resources, and one or more sinks configured to consume the output resources. The controller generates a resource balance constraint that requires balance between a first amount of each resource and a second amount of each resource. The first amount of each resource includes a sum of an amount of the resource supplied by the sources and an amount of the resource produced by the subplants. The second amount of each resource includes a sum of an amount of the resource consumed by the subplants and an amount of the resource consumed by the sinks. The controller performs an optimization of an objective function subject to the resource balance constraint to determine target amounts of each resource to be produced or consumed by the central plant equipment at a plurality of times within an optimization period.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 14, 2019
    Date of Patent: March 23, 2021
    Assignee: Johnson Controls Technology Company
    Inventors: Michael J. Wenzel, Matthew J. Ellis
  • Patent number: 10955800
    Abstract: Granular assets of a building are identified. Each granular asset represents one or more devices of that operate to produce, consume, or store resources in the building. General assets are defined by grouping the granular assets into groups. A non-granular optimization is performed to determine a non-granular allocation of the resources among the general assets. Non-granular allocation defines an amount of each of the resources consumed, produced, or stored by each of the general assets at each time step in a time period. A granular optimization is performed for each general asset to determine a granular allocation of the resources among the granular assets. The granular allocation defines an amount of each resource consumed, produced, or stored by the granular assets at each time step in the time period. The equipment of the building are operated to consume, produce, or store the amount of each resource defined by granular allocation.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 17, 2019
    Date of Patent: March 23, 2021
    Assignee: Johnson Controls Technology Company
    Inventors: John H. Burroughs, Andrew J. Przybylski, Michael J. Wenzel, Matthew J. Ellis
  • Patent number: 10949777
    Abstract: An energy cost optimization system for a building includes HVAC equipment configured to operate in the building and a controller. The controller is configure to generate a cost function defining a cost of operating the HVAC equipment over an optimization period as a function of one or more electric loads for the HVAC equipment. The controller is further configured to generate participation hours. The participation hours indicate one or more hours that the HVAC equipment will participate in an economic load demand response (ELDR) program. The controller is further configured to generate an ELDR term based on the participation hours, the ELDR term indicating revenue generated by participating in the ELDR program. The controller is further configured to modify the cost function to include the ELDR term and perform an optimization using the modified cost function to determine an optimal electric load for each hour of the participation hours.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 7, 2017
    Date of Patent: March 16, 2021
    Assignee: Johnson Controls Technology Company
    Inventors: Mohammad N. ElBsat, Michael J. Wenzel
  • Publication number: 20210072742
    Abstract: A method for performing model predictive maintenance (MPM) of building equipment includes obtaining a first objective function that defines a cost of operating the building equipment and at least one of replacing the building equipment or performing maintenance on the building equipment as a function of operating decisions and at least one of replacement decisions or maintenance decisions for the building equipment for multiple short-term time steps within a short-term horizon. The method also includes performing a first optimization of the first objective function to generate a short-term maintenance and replacement schedule for the building equipment over a duration of the short-term horizon. The method also includes using a result of the first optimization to perform a second optimization of a second objective function to generate a long-term maintenance and replacement schedule for the building equipment over a duration of a long-term horizon.
    Type: Application
    Filed: September 10, 2020
    Publication date: March 11, 2021
    Applicant: Johnson Controls Technology Company
    Inventors: Yaqing WU, Mohammad N. ELBSAT, Michael J. WENZEL, Christos T. MARAVELIAS
  • Publication number: 20210063976
    Abstract: A system controlling equipment to serve energy loads of a building includes a cost function generator configured to obtain a cost function of decision variables representing an amount of resources consumed or produced by the equipment, an optimizer configured to perform a first optimization of the cost function subject to a first set of constraints defining first values of constraint variables to generate a first result defining first values of decision variables, a constraint modifier configured determine a cost gradient, recommend changes to constraint variables, and modify constraint variables to modified values in response to changes. The optimizer is configured to perform an optimization of the cost function subject to a second set of constraints to generate a second optimization result defining second values of the decision variables. The system includes a controller that operates equipment to consume or produce resources defined by second values of the decision variables.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 29, 2019
    Publication date: March 4, 2021
    Applicant: Johnson Controls Technology Company
    Inventors: John H. Burroughs, Andrew J. Przybylski, Michael J. Wenzel