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John Aulbach, P.E., CEM, Architecture can have a great influence on key energy demands such as ventilation, lighting, cooling and heating. When thoroughly informed about the complex synergies between building design and energy use, architects and designers can make informed and cost effective primary decisions about energy savings features in their buildings. In order to make these decisions, it is particularly important to understand the energy tradeoffs in the early stages of a project. Glumac has the capabilities to quickly and assuredly develop complex energy information and present it to architects, designers, building owners and energy-efficiency agencies in an easily accessible and user-friendly manner. About Energy Modeling A valuable and powerful tool for informing design decisions is computer energy modeling. Far from the old spreadsheet of heating and cooling estimates based on single design days or temperature-bin methods, modern energy modeling can encompass virtually every aspect of a new or existing building€™s energy dynamics. The US Green Building Council (USGBC), several state government energy agencies, the US Department of Energy, and major utilities have embraced such energy modeling over the past 25 years. Many of the codes and utility incentives encourage using these modeling tools to promote leading edge energy-efficient technologies and designs. Glumac has teams of professional engineers skilled in energy modeling in several of its offices. To support the expertise of our energy modeling staff, Glumac utilizes the most recent, tried-and-true energy modeling tool: eQUEST, (The Quick Energy Simulation Tool). The program uses a Windows operating system married to an advanced version of the DOE-2 hourly simulation program "engine." DOE-2 was developed by the United States Department of Energy in the late 1970s and has been continuously upgraded to this day. The evolution of the DOE-2 was funded by many national utilities as well as the Gas Research Institute, Electric Power Research Institute, and Battelle Northwest Labs. The most powerful aspect of eQUEST is its ability to quickly build a complex and diverse building of any size, type, and location in the United States. This building model is run against an entire year that encompasses 8,760 operational hours of weather data. Utilizing this data, the program develops a reasonable idea of the monthly and annual energy uses for electricity, gas, oil, chilled and hot water, or other end-use energy consumption. The program also generates a floor-by-floor 2-dimension plan and a 3-dimension rotating image of the entire building. These images can be developed from just a few macroscopic bits of general data input by the program user. Below is a generic model of a mixed-use residential building developed with minimum direction and input. The resulting model yields reasonable energy metrics. Architects can also use the model to experiment with building orientation, window-wall ratio, glass type and tint, shading, and other building features. The program will quickly reprogram the input, rerun the model, and have new answers within minutes.
This highly complex model generally takes daysto input where older programs of more limited scope (and no building renderings) took weeks and even months.
Most types of HVAC systems (both packaged and chilled/hot water) can be fully simulated so that control enhancements can be investigated. There are a broad variety of possible HVAC systems that can be modeled, including air source, water source, and ground source heat pumps. Central plant technologies include gas and electric chillers, primary/secondary pumping, cogeneration, thermal storage, boiler heat recovery, and even photovoltaics. Most combinations of electric/thermal technologies can be simulated and compared, making it possible for engineers to collaborate with architects and designers to optimize both the design and operations of central plants. The Glumac energy team has already developed several of these buildings for Oregon and Washington LEED®submittals. We can create such models for virtually any type and configuration of building. We can also investigate the energy tradeoffs anywhere on Earth. Using these modeling techniques, Glumac€™s energy team can assist our clients in making wise energy decisions early in the design process.
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[ARTICLE] Glumac Relocates to LEED Platinum-Designed Office at the Standard Insurance Center 26-Apr-2012[ARTICLE] Creating Gensler's "Jewel Box" 06-Feb-2012
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