This article is part of BD+C's special five-part Technology Report 2014: Top tech tools and trends for AEC professionals.
For more than a decade, the U.S. Department of Energy has made its EnergyPlus energy analysis and thermal load simulation program available for free to Building Teams.
Using EnergyPlus, AEC professionals can model heating, cooling, lighting, ventilation, and other energy flows, as well as water consumption, within a building design.
But without a major rewrite of the program since its creation, using EnergyPlus could exhibit slow performance and occasionally inaccurate analysis results.
The programming language it was originally written in, Fortran, simply could not keep up with advances in the hardware and software computing environment. FORTRAN is a language aimed at scientific programs to be run by scientists for days and weeks on supercomputers, not by building designers running multiple iterations of a design idea in a matter of a few hours.
Because it wasn't well integrated with common architectural design software, EnergyPlus never gained widespread adoption by architects working in the conceptual stage of a project.
At Greenbuild 2013, Autodesk (working pro bono) turned over brand new engine source code to the DOE to create a completely rewritten EnergyPlus for a forthcoming version. The new code will be made available under the DOE’s open source license.
Autodesk’s software engineers translated EnergyPlus—more than 600,000 lines of code—to C++, a modern, object-oriented language that is better supported on mass-market hardware and software platforms.
As a result, a larger ecosystem of developers and vendors will be able to contribute updates to the code in order to improve performance and decrease the time required to run energy model simulations.
The forthcoming version will also work better with BIM applications, auditing tools, and energy dashboards after it is released and developers are able to work on improved integrations.
For more, visit: http://apps1.eere.energy.gov/buildings/energyplus.
Related Stories
| Jul 16, 2013
Robotics: A new way to demolish buildings
A robot prototype uses water jets to break up concrete structures and then sucks up the water and debris for reuse and recycling.
| Jul 15, 2013
Mergers and acquisitions transform engineering sector [2013 Giants 300 Report]
Merger and acquisition deals by MEP, commissioning, structural, and specialty engineering firms were up 14% nationwide in 2012 compared with 2011.
| Jul 15, 2013
Top Engineering/Architecture Firms [2013 Giants 300 Report]
Jacobs, AECOM, Parsons Brinckerhoff top Building Design+Construction's 2013 ranking of the largest engineering/architecture firms in the United States.
| Jul 15, 2013
Top Architecture/Engineering Firms [2013 Giants 300 Report]
Stantec, HOK, HDR top Building Design+Construction's 2013 ranking of the largest architecture/engineering firms in the United States.
| Jul 15, 2013
Top Architecture Firms [2013 Giants 300 Report]
Gensler, Perkins+Will, NBBJ top Building Design+Construction's 2013 ranking of the largest architecture firms in the United States.
| Jul 15, 2013
Zaha Hadid unveils plan for boutique condo development in New York
Related Companies taps the London-based architect for the 11-story 520 West 28th Street residential development adjacent to the High Line in Chelsea.
| Jul 12, 2013
12 award-winning healthcare projects [slideshow]
AIA's Academy of Architecture for Health announced the recipients of the 2013 AIA National Healthcare Design Awards.
| Jul 11, 2013
Bill to borrow more for college spending in Michigan criticized due to ‘higher-ed bubble’
An amendment to a Michigan appropriations budget authorizes an increase in state debt to pay for state university construction projects. But some experts see a “higher education bubble” on the horizon, and said more taxpayer debt for more buildings is a bad idea.
| Jul 11, 2013
Skanska exits U.S. Chamber of Commerce over LEED controversy
Skanska USA resigned from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce over the Chamber’s decision to support the American High-Performance Buildings Coalition.