Energy modeling played a major role in reaching the sustainability goals of the project. The extreme weather conditions of the site at Erie, Pennsylvania were taken into account in the preliminary design. Based on the initial recommendations provided by the SSLD (Sustainable Sites and Landscape Design) student team, the designs were later assessed for their energy performance using energy modeling tools such as Revit’s Whole Building Energy Analysis. The data provided by the software was used to breakdown the performance of the various building elements such as the envelope, fenestration, mechanical systems, etc. All the data amounted to the understanding of the Energy Use Intensity (EUI), a metric that defined the energy use of the building. As expected, each of the team’s designs gave varied results and the SSLD team was able to provide recommendations and feedback based on the results of the energy modeling. The changes made in the designs later reflected in a reduced EUI in the final design pointing to the successful integration both of the collaboration system and the technology into the process.
Delving deep into energy modeling resulted in the emergence of an improved process that incorporates energy modeling at the initial stages.