[Equest-users] Single-Family Residence

[Chris Balbach]

Fransisco:

There are many 'calculators' and simplified energy tools on the market 
that can be applied for residential energy modeling and predictions of 
savings. Most of them use 'simplified' algorithms or bin types of 
analysis. A few use whole building energy modeling like E-Quest. IMHO, 
although it can be used, E-Quest is serious overkill for what you are 
probably looking to accomplish.

If you are looking for a 8760 (hourly) whole building energy simulation 
tool that was designed specifically for modeling the energy usage in 
single and multifamily residences, I suggest you take a look at TREAT 
software. TREAT (Targeted Retrofit Energy Analysis Tool) wraps an easy 
to use interface around SUNREL, an hourly calculation engine developed 
by NREL.

The TREAT software integrates a billing analysis module, which allows 
users to import both actual electric and fuel bills along with matching 
real weather data, create a baseline model, and then interactively 
adjust the 'baseline' model's predicted energy use to closely match 
amounts of energy and fuel consumed by the structure using weather 
normalized actual bills. In addition, once the user has created a 
'trued-up' baseline model, TREAT provides a easy to use scenario 
management tool which allows for easy generation of improvements and 
packages (collections of improvements) with a focus of identifying 
packages with the cost effective results (in other words , best 
cost-benefit ratios).  Finally, TREAT has an easy interface to allow for 
post construction utility bills and post construction actual weather to 
be imported, where output from the model used to predict energy savings 
can be compared to actual energy savings, fuel by fuel, to verify the 
predicted savings are being delivered (or more importantly quickly 
identify if they are not).  This can be done after month one of post 
construction, giving 'fast feedback' to the homeowner as to whether the 
improvements they invested in are having the desired energy savings impact.

A 30 day fully functional version of TREAT can be downloaded from 
http://www.treatsoftware.com. I would encourage you to check it out, 
especially if you are working with existing single family homes. We 
train contractors to model single family homes in TREAT in 2 hours or 
less (from the time they sit down for data input to the time they 
produce a comprehensive work scope and proposal for a homeowner).  It 
can be a powerful energy prediction and monitoring tool in the hands of 
a competent user.

Best,

_Chris

Chris Balbach, Vice President of Research and Development
Performance Systems Development
124 Brindley Street, Suite 4, Ithaca, NY 14850
http://www.psdconsulting.com
ph: (607)-327-1647

Francisco Rodriguez-Ema wrote:
>
> Is equest effective for single-family homes energy modelling?
>
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