AEC TECH NEWS #153
19 Oct, 2005AEC Technology in the News
AIA looks at post-Katrina construction;NIST reports on airtight building design;
and DOE upgrades EnergyPlus
The American
Institute of Architects has released a report on the effects of Hurricane
Katrina on the U.S. Gulf Coast region and the projected aftermath and longer-term
outlook. The report, "Economic and Construction Outlook in the Gulf States After
Hurricane Katrina," was prepared by Economy.com, an economics consulting
firm that specializes in forecasting regional growth patterns. It pulls heavily
from data compiled by Economy.com and from surveys of AIA members regarding
the timeline of rebuilding following past natural disasters.
Total damages of Hurricane Katrina are estimated at $150 billion to $200
billion, according to the report -- truly a staggering amount of money. Not
addressed in the report is the equally staggering human toll, in terms of
lives lost and those permanently disrupted. This event has been described
as the single most costly natural disaster ever in U.S. history, and its effects
will be felt for many years into the future.
The AIA report concentrates on residential housing stock in the region.
Accurate estimates of losses to nonresidential buildings and public infrastructure
are not available, but are expected to be considerable. Loss of housing stock
in the region is estimated at 275,000-300,000 homes, some of them perhaps
lost permanently. Equal numbers of homes are not necessarily lost but are
in need of major repair.
The report breaks down projected economic impacts and population fluctuations
in 2006 and 2008 by three states -- Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama --
and assesses the potential short-term impacts on building materials and labor
availability in the region. Building materials costs are expected to rise
and likely result in short-term shortages of certain materials. Labor needs
are likely to rise, but this coincides with a projected national downturn
in residential construction, so labor needs in the Gulf Region are likely
to be met by an influx of people seeking opportunities there. Except for
a projected shortage of some specialized engineering disciplines, the report
is not specific about the availability of building design professionals in
the region -- which is somewhat surprising in a report commissioned by AIA.
The full report is available using the link above.
NIST Studies Energy Impact of Building Envelopes
Another interesting report was released recently by NIST (National
Institute of Standards and Technology), titled "Investigation of the Impact of Commercial Building Envelope
Airtightness on HVAC Energy Use." It states that increasing the air-tightness
of building envelope construction could result in significant improvements
in energy use nationwide. This conclusion seems fairly intuitive and obvious:
Reducing air infiltration in typical buildings should reduce the need for
heating and cooling. But I found it somewhat ironic, as well.
At a time when architects and engineers have been roundly
criticized for designing air-tight buildings without operable windows, this
report suggests this could be exactly the right approach. Operable windows
have been anathema to HVAC engineers for many years because it's difficult
to quantify what humans are likely to do if given control of air infiltration.
If a critical factor such as outdoor air intake is not under the designer's
control, it's challenging to design for optimum economic system efficiency.
On the other hand, operable windows in some buildings
could provide occasional, adequate control of the indoor temperature of many
buildings, without additional energy use. Even so, solar radiation can heat
one part of a building enough to require cooling, while another part in the
shade requires indoor heating. What's the poor HVAC engineer to do? Assume
that the human occupants will exert the proper control of the system as designed?
That could result in some interesting lawsuits.
AEC technology today can analyze building design and
address this specific problem. BIM (building information modeling) should
eventually be able to analyze the variable factors on a more detailed, space-by-space
basis and point toward the most economical system for a specific building
in a specific climate. It should greatly enable finding the most economical
and energy-efficient solution at an early stage in the design cycle. It's
not there yet, but it's coming.
DOE
Upgrades EnergyPlus
DOE (U.S. Department of
Energy) recently released version 1.2.3 of the free EnergyPlus software
for building energy analysis. EnergyPlus has been in development at DOE for
many years -- in previous incarnations under names such as BLAST and DOE-2
-- and it has been used as the computational foundation underlying many engineering
energy-analysis programs. However, it has remained off the radar screen for
most architects and building designers because for most of them, EnergyPlus
is of little use by itself. DOE has not developed a user interface that makes
EnergyPlus very usable to anyone except a computer software engineer who can
provide the necessary input format and make the output easily understood and
usable.
But third-party developers have been creating user interfaces separately,
and several examples are available for different purposes. Perhaps some enterprising
organization is even now developing an aecXML input interface, and a direct
link to a BIM model, to enable building designers to use the results in responding
to the information in the NIST report about building energy use.
Download a free copy and check it out for yourself.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Michael L. Dakan, AIA, is an architect, author and independent AEC technology consultant. E-mail him at michael.dakan@cadalyst.com.
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