Reinforcement learning (RL) has proven effective for AI-based building energy management. However, there is a lack of flexible framework to implement RL across various control problems in building energy management. To address this gap, we propose BuildingGym, an open-source tool designed as a research-friendly and flexible framework for training RL control strategies for common challenges in building energy management. BuildingGym integrates EnergyPlus as its core simulator, making it suitable for both system-level and room-level control. Additionally, BuildingGym is able to accept external signals as control inputs instead of taking the building as a stand-alone entity. This feature makes BuildingGym applicable for more flexible environments, e.g. smart grid and EVs community. The tool provides several built-in RL algorithms for control strategy training, simplifying the process for building managers to obtain optimal control strategies. Users can achieve this by following a few straightforward steps to configure BuildingGym for optimization control for common problems in the building energy management field. Moreover, AI specialists can easily implement and test state-of-the-art control algorithms within the platform. BuildingGym bridges the gap between building managers and AI specialists by allowing for the easy configuration and replacement of RL algorithms, simulators, and control environments or problems. With BuildingGym, we efficiently set up training tasks for cooling load management, targeting both constant and dynamic cooling load management. The built-in algorithms demonstrated strong performance across both tasks, highlighting the effectiveness of BuildingGym in optimizing cooling strategies.

The intersection of the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) and artificial intelligence (AI) has garnered ever-increasing attention and research interest. Nevertheless, the dilemma between the strict resource-constrained nature of IIoT devices and the extensive resource demands of AI has not yet been fully addressed with a comprehensive solution. Taking advantage of the lightweight constructive neural network (LightGCNet) in developing fast learner models for IIoT, a convex geometric constructive neural network with a low-complexity control strategy, namely, ConGCNet, is proposed in this article via convex optimization and matrix theory, which enhances the convergence rate and reduces the computational consumption in comparison with LightGCNet. Firstly, a low-complexity control strategy is proposed to reduce the computational consumption during the hidden parameters training process. Secondly, a novel output weights evaluated method based on convex optimization is proposed to guarantee the convergence rate. Finally, the universal approximation property of ConGCNet is proved by the low-complexity control strategy and convex output weights evaluated method. Simulation results, including four benchmark datasets and the real-world ore grinding process, demonstrate that ConGCNet effectively reduces computational consumption in the modelling process and improves the model’s convergence rate.