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NREL / EnergyPlus

EnergyPlus™ is a whole building energy simulation program that engineers, architects, and researchers use to model both energy consumption and water use in buildings.
https://energyplus.net
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Add capability to model Ice and Snow Melting on Building Exteriors #6628

Open aaron-boranian opened 6 years ago

aaron-boranian commented 6 years ago

Problem: Some high-end buildings use pipes embedded in sidewalks and parking lots to provide a safer, ice-free area around a building. While EnergyPlus has much of the weather information needed to potentially model these systems, there is nothing in EnergyPlus that can be used to include the energy consumption of these systems.

Rationale: While research has been done on these systems, none of it has been implemented in EnergyPlus. This new model would increase the capabilities of the program and allow the energy consumption of ice melting systems to be included in the overall results of the program.

Solution: Add the physical ice melting model to EnergyPlus as well as the ability to place various horizontal or sloped surfaces to the program so that it can determine any potential shading. The model would then need to be integrated with plant loops so that the energy required could be supplied by existing EnergyPlus models.

Migrated from UserVoice feedback from @RKStrand

paul-caicedo commented 3 years ago

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