10
Aug 21

CLIMATE CHANGE EMERGENCY

Climate change is having a significant impact on businesses, society, and individuals. It is increasingly understood that a shift towards a low-carbon economy is needed. The building and construction sector plays a central role in this shift. The sector’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions account for approximately 40% of global GHG emissions. The major contributors to these emissions are the materials used as well as the heating, cooling, and lighting of buildings and infrastructure.

For example, around 80% of UK buildings that will be occupied in 2050 have already been built. Long-term adaptation strategies are therefore necessary to ensure that buildings and the built environment are resilient to future climate impacts.

For high performance buildings an early exercise with Building Performance Simulation by Energy Modelling enables the evaluation of numerous solutions to explore these parameters:

  • Low embodied energy with environmental appropriate materials
  • Lower costs with selection of new materials and technologies
  • Hybrid solutions
  • On-site generation and energy storage systems
  • Level of disruption to occupants

These are just some of the factors and this process starts with simple modelling.

Building professionals including Architects will generally require a visual 3D model at an early stage.

 The Greenspace Live gModeller based on Trimble Sketchup enables an early exercise in Energy Modelling and energy analysis engine gEnergy enables full dynamic simulation to optimise solutions and address the emergency.


10
May 19

Climate Change

To reduce emissions in the built environment to demanding levels requires both conversation measures and low carbon heating/cooling sources.

This requires deep renovation of buildings and higher rates of renovation.

For high performance buildings an early exercise with Building Performance Simulation by Energy Modelling enables the evaluation of numerous solutions to explore some example parameters:

  • Low embodied energy with environmental appropriate materials
  • Lower costs with selection of new materials and technologies
  • Hybrid solutions
  • On-site generation and energy storage systems
  • Level of disruption to occupants

These are just some of the factors and this process starts with simple modelling.

Building professionals including Architects will generally require a visual 3D model at an early stage.

The GreenspaceLive gModeller based on Trimble Sketchup enables an early exercise in Energy Modelling. The energy analysis engine gEnergy enables full dynamic simulation.


03
Dec 18

gEnergy is the web interface to EnergyPlus

Our software provides a user interface for the EnergyPlus simulation engine. gModeller facilitates easy entry of building geometry and fabric constructions using Sketchup and gEnergy allows the full scope of EnergyPlus objects to be edited.

For detailed information on the actual energy simulation you are best to refer to the Energy plus Input/Output and Engineering Reference manuals:

Input Output Reference (PDF)
Engineering Reference (PDF)

Also, Big Ladder Software provide training on EnergyPlus and have some very good reference material on their website that is easier to navigate.

EnergyPlus Web-Based Documentation

Weather data is available for over 2000 global locations. Data is in a standard, well documented, EPW format so it is also possible to construct your own weather files if you have localised data available of if you wish to push your model through some extreme weather events. The following link provides a map of locations:

Weather

The link below is to a guide on using EnergyPlus for producing compliance reports:

Using EnergyPlus for Compliance (PDF)


27
Nov 13

Introducing the gEnergyWiki and Public Projects!

We’ve just activated our gEnergy wiki – 450 EnergyPlus sample projects linked to gEnergy Public Projects. Click here to visit it! 

Each wiki page links to a corresponding gEnergy Public Project which can be used to inspect and query the EnergyPlus model. Eg:
http://greenspacelive.com/genergy/gsl/publiceditor#PublicProjectPlace:9226

We’re looking to add more and get world-class Revit/gbXML/SketchUp/EnergyPlus experts contributing, why not contact us to get involved?

Daily updates and focus projects can be found and followed on Twitter @greenspaceLive

19
Sep 13

gEnergy Feature Spotlight: Collaborate at project and object levels

The 21st century office is changing. Already you might have people working from home, from another office or even from another country! But a 21st century office needs a 21st century solution; Online collaboration.

gEnergy supports collaboration and remote working by allowing users to share projects with others, and comment at project and object levels.

This means that users can discuss the project at a higher level, for example to discuss requirements, work left to do, project management, etc., and at the same time discuss specific objects in detail. This opens up many possibilities for collaboration.

For example, if there is a question regarding an HVAC component, users can discuss the object at its own level, without cluttering overall project discussions. Similarly, a project manager can review the object model, comment on objects of concern, and collaborate with the modelling team to ensure the quality of the model is as high as possible.

Comment and leave messages for your team in a pinch

 

You can learn more about gEnergy’s features here.

Or why not start a free trial here and experience the power of gEnergy today.

 


17
Sep 13

gEnergy Feature Spotlight: Edit multiple objects at once

EnergyPlus models can be large and complex, composed of many different objects. gEnergy is no exception!

However, we’ve found over time that many objects share common attributes. For example, many surfaces may share the same constructions. Going through each of these surfaces to add the same attributes is a tedious task, in some cases, watching paint dry may end up be more entertaining!

gEnergy allows you to select and edit multiple objects at the same time, so that setting the properties of groups of objects becomes as simple as pressing the ctrl, or shift key, selecting the objects in question and changing the appropriate parameters. A massive productivity boost!

Editing Multiple objects with gEnergy is simple

 

You can learn more about gEnergy’s features here.

Or why not start a free trial here and experience the power of gEnergy today.


12
Sep 13

gEnergy Feature Spotlight: Customised Reporting

With most energy simulation, you’ll produce a large amount of simulation data, but what does it mean?

Without seeing your data in a meaningful way, does it actually mean anything?

With gEnergy, data can be charted and viewed the way that you want to using gEnergy’s customisable dashboard based charting.

gEnergy’s dashboard based reporting allows the adding and removing of custom charts, edit existing charts, select hourly, monthly, and annual result parameters. Mix and match reports to meet your needs.

All simulation results can be exported and downloaded from gEnergy for further analysis in downstream tools, e.g.Microsoft Excel as well as presented from gEnergy’s web interface, which is accessible anywhere.

gEnergy’s customizable reporting interface is clean and easy to use.

You can learn more about gEnergy’s features here.

Or why not start a free trial here and experience the power of gEnergy today.

 


08
Aug 13

Introducing gEnergy and our Beta test program!

gEnergy brings building simulation to the cloud, enabling architects, engineers and building owners to design and operate energy and resource efficient 21st century buildings. A new addition to the greenspaceLive gTools suite, gEnergy, is a powerful building information and energy modelling tool using the EnergyPlus platform. New-build and retrofit modelling scenarios can be rapidly explored, minimising construction and operational stage problems, raising design-team productivity and lowering cost of build and ownership.

gEnergy enables creation of new EnergyPlus models and imports SketchUp, Revit, gbXML and IDF models. Over 600 building objects, constructions and HVAC systems are supported in our easy to use Web interface.

Learn more about gEnergy…

Beginning today, the gEnergy Beta Program will give existing subscribers access to gEnergy before our general release. Our goals with this program are to expand our pool of testers and gain feedback across a more diverse set of devices. Just by using gEnergy and reporting issues, beta testers will be able to help us improve performance on a wide variety of browsers and devices we may have otherwise been unable to test at scale.

This will give greenspaceLive the opportunity to eliminate any issues and identify the diversity of our user base to test our future gEnergy builds so, when we release to the open market, everyone has a better experience. Whether you use Firefox, Chrome or Internet Explorer, more complete testing coverage gives us the opportunity to make sure more people can access a stable high-performance platform.

Anyone with an active subscription can join the beta program. You can access gEnergy through its portal on our website. We ask that you use gEnergy like you would normally use an EnergyPlus editor, but that you submit a report whenever you encounter a bug or other issue. Because gEnergy will be a Beta build, it will have features that may still be in progress and as a result, be less stable than you may be accustomed to. Feedback on stability, as well as any other performance issues you experience, is crucial and deeply appreciated.

To join our Beta program, follow these steps:

1)      Register on our website (if you do not already have account)

2)      Visit the gEnergy page and log in

3)     Submit feedback through the webform (at the top right of the program) in gEnergy

4)      We’ll contact you with a survey during the beta program, we would be greatful if you completed it

If you have any questions about our gEnergy beta program, or regarding the software, contact us! We’ll be more than happy to answer your questions.