ISO 52016-1 buildings’ energy performance analysis made easier

With the recent update of the EPBD directive, assessing buildings’ energy performance has become crucial, and compliance involves adhering to ISO 52000 for energy needs calculation. To answer this need, the team of the Institute for Renewable Energy of Eurac Research has created an open-source Python library, called “pybuildingenergy” to perform building analyses.

The library allows the assessment of building performance both in terms of energy and comfort. In this initial release, the energy performance of the building is assessed using ISO 52016-1:2017. 

Thanks to the library, it is possible to calculate:

1. the (sensible) energy need for heating and cooling, based on hourly or monthly calculations;
2. the internal temperature, based on hourly calculations;
3. the sensible heating and cooling load, based on hourly calculations.

The analyses are simulations made using building archetypes and also with a test building (Best test 600). In particular, for this latter case, simulations were compared with the results from EnergyPlus.

Any building in the world can be evaluated, with some limitations on the type of building: for now, the library works on single-zone buildings with floor-to-ceiling and roof. So, buildings including several apartment can be evaluated as a whole.

The team is already working to update the library in the coming months: new addition will include the use of machine learning to calibrate the model with real data, and the development of technical-economic analysis tools on the application of construction packages for building renovation.

The library is accessible at pybuildingenergy · PyPI and documentation is available at pybuildingenergy 0.0.1 documentation

The team welcomes feedback and suggestions, so download the library and let them know what you think!

The library was developed in the INFINITE and MODERATE projects.