Abstract
Load demand forecasting is crucial for optimal energy management and sustaining comfortable indoor environments for air conditioning systems. The current research provides load demand prediction by a new modified rotor Hopfield neural network (RHNN) integrated with a fractional order of seasons optimization algorithm (FO-SOA) to overcome the challenge of predicting load demand. The RHNN extracts historical data patterning and predicts load demand prediction for future time using past data, and the FO-SOA includes infinitesimal calculus in its process to optimize its solution by considering repeating operation of honeybee agent and also extracting long-term memory operation without requiring additional memory access in the process to make it best at exploration/exploitation among optimization process. The model includes an incorporation model of key factors including ambient temperature, humidity, occupancy pattern, etc., for enhancing the reliability and the prediction accuracy. A case study validated the proposed RHNN/FO-SOA model and allowed for a comparison with several state-of-the-art methods, such as LSTM-based hybrid ensemble learning (LSTM/HEL), LSTM/RNN, deep neural networks (DNN), and deep learning models (DLM). The results showcase optimal performance, yielding an R(2) value of 0.95, along with the lowest MSE, RMSE, and MAE values when compared to the other tested models. A correction coefficient increased the goodness of fit from 0.77 to 0.85. The RHNN/FO-SOA method may contribute to improve energy performance and reduce costs in air conditioners, shown by the findings.