Presentation 1
Title: EnergyPlus for Early Design and Single Zone Studies; David Fannon AIA, Senior Associate, Senior High Performance Specialist, Syska Hennessy Group, Inc.
Description: This talk focuses on using COMFEN to run simplified EnergyPlus models which inform early design-decisions and perform simple single-zone studies quickly and relatively inexpensively. Using examples from recent projects, we will discuss ways to use COMFEN both an interface for rapid simulation and as a ready-made database that can be manipulated outside the GUI for comparative studies. The presentation concludes with some notes on analyzing the results, the limitations of the tool and Quality Assurance processes.
About the Speaker: David is a New York- based member of Syska Hennessy’s High Performance Solutions team, with broad perspective and experience as a designer, building science researcher and teacher. His expertise lies in integrating research, analysis, and design to provide luminous, thermal and acoustic comfort while reducing resource consumption in buildings. In the summer of 2011 David traveled to Japan as part of the Architecture.Energy.2011 workshop to assist architects rebuilding after the natural and nuclear disasters. He spent two years as a student and researcher in the Center for the Built Environment at the University of California Berkeley, and is currently completing his degree. David holds a Bachelor of Architecture degree from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and is a registered architect in the State of New York.
Presentation 2
Title: N++: A demonstration of the latest GUI for EnergyPlus; Vladimir Bajic – Senior Energy Engineer and Software Developer
Description: N++ is a building energy modeling software created to emulate the architectural and engineering design process. As a front interface for the highly capable EnergyPlus simulation engine, N++ allows the user to input project information into the energy simulation in an intuitive, highly visible fashion that simplifies the energy modeling process for designers who are new to energy analysis. During the presentation Mr. Bajic will demonstrate the construction of an energy model in N++, exemplifying the innovative features that simplify the construction of complex building geometries, lighting designs and mechanical systems. The presentation will also demonstrate the flexible capability of N++ to build multiple parametric runs and produce an energy code baseline quickly and easily.
About the Speaker: Mr. Bajic is a mechanical engineer with over 16 years of experience in the HVAC industry as a designer, energy modeler and software developer. His experience is both international and domestic. Mr.Bajic’s main focus is building software applications that will help architects and engineers design more efficient buildings as part of an integrated design process. Mr. Bajic is currently a senior energy engineer at Viridian Energy & Environmental (a Vidaris company). He is also the founder of the ExpertApp (expertapp.com), a software company that is specialized in creating engineering and architectural cad-based applications focused on integrated sustainable design.

Follow this link or click on the image below to get there: http://pinterest.com/bengtdahlgren/building-optimization/

For typical year data, this Web site features ASHRAE’s IWEC2 weather files for 3,012 international locations, as well as TMY3, CWEC2, and CZ2010 weather files for US, Canadian, and California locations, respectively.  IWEC2 weather files cost $35 each, the other sets are public data hosted with permission and are free.
For historical data, this Web site contains weather files from 2007 to 2012 for over 10,000 locations around the world, including over 1,500 in the US and 300 in Canada. Older weather files going back to 1980 are also available and can be be generated on request. The historical weather files have been processed by WBT and cost $50 each. A typical year weather file can also be produced on request for any location with 7 or more years of historical data.
All weather files are provided in two formats: *.BINM for use in DOE-2-derived programs and *.EPW for use in EnergyPlus-derived programs, including the DDY file. The IWEC2 files also contain an archival *.CSV format, and the historical files an archival *.FIN4 format.  Discount prices for large orders and subscriptions are also available.
Please check out the web site for more details
To go to  the  home page, click here http://weather.whiteboxtechnologies.com
To go directly to the IWEC2 weather page, click here http://weather.whiteboxtechnologies.com/ASHRAE
To go directly to the historical weather page, click here http://weather.whiteboxtechnologies.com/WD-hist

Read more on the Trelligence site: http://trelligence.com/Affinity8.php

Additionally, a new version of OpenStudio Legacy Plug-in for Trimble SketchUp is available, which makes it possible to perform EnergyPlus simulations using Sketchup’s user-friendly 3-D drawing interface.

Visit www.energyplus.gov to learn more and download EnergyPlus and OpenStudio Plug-in now.

Symposium on Sustainable Urban Design – Case Studies and Design Workflows
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, May 6 2013

Attendance is free if you RSVP by April 15th
Tentative Agenda (Link)

Over the next two decades, the United Nations expects that we need to plan, design and build new homes for 1.7 billion people. With buildings already accounting for some 40% of carbon emissions in many countries, the prospect of adding such titanic numbers to the built environment is worrisome. If we further add a 40% world-wide increase in transportation related carbon emissions, energy efficiency measures realized to date will be negated. There is an undeniable need for concepts and solutions that lead to more sustainable urban growth, concepts that work across a range of climates and cultures. What are those solutions? Are there good examples? How can we evaluate them on a large scale?

Find out more at the Sustainable Design Lab @ MIT page ..