Development of APPROVAL MANUAL for Energy Simulation Tool Approval

 

Conference Call No. 1

 

Draft Meeting Minutes

 

July 26, 2011

1:00 P.M. – 3:00 PM.

Department of Community Affairs
Building Codes and Standards
2555 Shumard Oak Boulevard
Tallahassee, Florida 32399-2100
(850) 487-1824

Meeting Purpose:

As part of the new 2010 Florida Energy Code, the Commission will be charged with the responsibility of approving energy simulation tools (tool).

 

Under the proposed service, the Contractor, JM Jadu Corp, will develop the procedure (aka Manual) for reviewing and validating the tools. 

Meeting Objectives:

The first conference call focused on introducing the Workgroup and Workplan (from the Contractor) to develop the Manual.  The Workplan was made available for review prior to the conference call.

 

Webinar Registrants:

 

Drew Smith, Rob Vieira, CW Macomber, Alfonso Fernandez-Fraga, Michael Medina, Rob Salcido, Philip Fairey, Joe Eysie, Muthusamy Swami, Jack Glenn, Marlita Peters, Paul Mashburn, Amador Barzaga, James Schock, Karl White, Joseph Belcher, Steven Feller, Yoel Puentes, Robert Phillips,  Jorge De la Llama, Paul Selman, Gary Carmack, Lawrence Maxwell, Richard Soto, Wes Roan, Micahel Walkowski, Frank Leverone, Ryan Ellis, Terrence Lambert, Diana Giraldo, Dwight Wilkes, Jim Larsen, Amanda Hickman, Ken Sagan, Rodger LeBrun, David Reed, Matthew Dobson, Bruce Layman, Edward Locke, Scott Akins, Anthony Poiston, Charles Faigle, John McFee, Sharon Durand, Dane Theodore, Oriol Haage, Dean Ruark, Mike Ennia, Bryan Botic, Lei Wang, Joe Bigelow and Dennis Stoer

 

Staff

Mo Madani, Ann Stanton, Anuka Sawh and Jonathan Jadunandan    

 

 

Meeting Agenda:

1.      Disclosures

2.      Participants introduction

3.      Review of proposed Workplan, which includes discussions on the objective, scope, schedule, manual format, reports, models, accuracy tests, reference materials and unique modeling items in the 2010 Florida building code.

4.      Proposed future conferences

5.      How to contact JM Jadu Corp to provide written comments, access to meeting minutes, etc.

6.      Action items, comments, questions and answers

7.      Adjourn

 

Note: This document is available to any person requiring materials in alternate format upon request.  Contact the Department of Community Affairs, 2555 Shumard Oak Boulevard, Tallahassee, Florida 32399-2100 or call 850-487-1824.

 

 

Webinar commenced as scheduled at 1 PM.  Mr. Mo Madani (Mo) stated the reasons for the project, obtained approval of the Workplan without comments or objections and took roll call.  As requested by Mr. Jadunandan (Jonathan), Mo informed the group that the 2010 building code is now scheduled to become effective on March 15th, 2012 instead of January 1st 2012.

 

Jonathan began his presentation by thanking Mo for the introduction of JM Jadu Corp and the update on the effective date for the 2010 building codes.  Jonathan disclosed that the meeting is recorded and ask each participant to state their name when making comments.  Jonathan stated that the purpose of today’s webinar is to gather intelligence and recommendations, based on the Florida Building Code, on what shall be considered as the minimum requirements that tool vendors need to abide by to obtain approval by the building commissioners. Jonathan stated that the objective is to have the manual completed by December 2011. 

 

Jonathan asked for a lively and informative discussion and suggested that the purpose of the power point slides is to aid the discussions of the Workgroup.  Jonathan showed a power point slide about the subject materials of the manual.  Jonathan stated that his team needs the Workgroup to give feedback in the areas of report generations (format and content), defining the standard reference design and the accuracy tests, if any, of the standard reference design.

 

Dr. Swami Muthusamy (Swami) asked about prescriptive requirements.  He suggested that we allow for the integration of the prescriptive methodologies.  The discussion continues with residential building codes.  Mo, Ms. Ann Stanton (Ann), Mr. Philip Fairey (Philip) and Swami concluded that the tool should at least be able to generate the forms identified in the building code for both residential and commercial buildings.

 

Mr. Alfonso Fernandez-Fraga (Al) suggested that the tool should have the updated versions of the building code programmed before the release of the building codes.  The tool should not be approved until all code revisions are included.  He stated that his team uses the tool as the method to confirm building code compliance.  He compared the concept to tax programs that needed to calculate IRS tax with correct calculations and report formatting. He suggested that approved tools should follow a similar concept for the building code.

 

David Reed (David) suggested a simple excel-like program, if it is consistent in generation of prescriptive items in a consistent format. 

 

Mo agreed that both residential and commercial software tools shall have a printout of prescriptive building code items in a consistent format, but it may be optional and not a minimum requirement.  Based on David’s opinion, Mo also suggested the possibility of a tool vendor providing a tool that satisfy only the prescriptive requirements and not the modeling needs.  Both Philip and David agreed.

 

Jonathan then moved on to discuss the Standard Reference Design.  Philip commented that the tool should automatically generate the standard reference design from the user inputs. Jonathan confirms that it is stated as such in the building code.  The rule set to define the standard reference design is contained within the building code.  The discussion continues with the possibility of users violating the rule set.  Rob Vieira (Rob V.). suggested that the tool should run an error check against the user design to ensure that the user design does not violate any of the rules. Philip states that most of the tool does not auto-generate, but theirs does. 

 

Lei Wang (?) asked why are we evaluating tools and Ann explained that the Building Commissioner no longer reference a single tool as the de facto reference starting with the 2010 building code release.  The commissioners may approve any tool that meets the minimum requirements.

 

Jonathan asked about conclusive minimum requirements on what the software tool should generate.  It was agreed that all prescriptive (mandatory items) should be generated by the tool and printed out in a standard report.

 

Jonathan then moved on to discuss reference test materials for the model accuracy.  Philip pointed out that RESNET Publication 07-003 contains two sets of auto-generation tests, neither one of those auto-generated tests are correct for Florida’s code, so they would have to be modified, so that they are pertinent to Florida’s climate and Florida’s code.

 

Swami said that almost the same thing applies to commercial. There are two aspects of the first test. One is testing the engine which is basically the standard 140.  However, Swami stated that testing all the references with generation is non-existent for commercial.  He said that COMNET has reference building tests only for Appendix G, which is the rating model, and the code is based on ASHRAE Standard 90.1 Chapter 11, which could be one test approach.

 

In conclusion, Swami stated that there are no reference building test for commercial as of yet. The only thing that is available is the standard 140, which tests the models.

 

Ann asked Swami if he have any suggestions on how to deal with and demonstrate this issue. Swami stated that the only thing he can think of is regenerative reference cases for Appendix G. One has to sit down and figure out the building times. Perhaps, the building times and the type of test cases can come out of COMNET.  However, the results will be slightly different. Swami suggested going through Chapter 11 and see for those buildings, what should be Chapter 11 baseline as opposed to building baseline and produce those buildings.

 

Philip noted the California energy commission’s ACM approval manual on the power point list. Philip suggested that there are wonderful things to draw from, but one needs to be warned that the uses and criteria are different than the ASHRAE Standard 90.1 criteria, specifically they use different criteria for the reference building, for example, the HVAC systems. Swami agreed.

 

Mo asked for confirmation about the availability of accuracy tests.  Philip and Swami confirm that there are not any available tests applicable to Florida without modifications.  Swami mentioned that there is no test for building code in the entire nation, let alone Florida.

 

Mo asked for the possible and available options and ways to validating the tool.

 

David suggested that the manual is the code and the real issue is validating the tool.

 

Rob V. suggested that the RESNET suite of tests may work on the residential side.

 

David and Dennis concluded that the State of Florida is going to end up comparing vendors to pre-approved tool within given limits, otherwise one would get different outputs from different tools and it would become a mess.  Al agreed that each tool vendor will generate unique results.  He mentioned that no one is going to come up with matching results using different energy modeling methodologies that is going to be the same for similar buildings. He did not think we should establish that as a goal, but that we need to strive for what was established at the beginning of the meeting; and that is what we need to require from the vendors and what testing can be good enough with the understanding that no testing is perfect.  Al also inquired on how the Florida Solar Energy Center tool was validated.

 

Mo stresses the importance of the building commission to take this issue up and approve a tool package that is credible as soon as possible, otherwise we are going to end up without any tool.

 

Philip informed the group that energy gauge tool, both the residential and commercial, has been subjected to and passed every known test for tool verification that is out there.

 

Jack suggested that whatever that verification system was, that should be the specifications in this manual.

 

Philip pointed out that the validation of energy gauge tool was their initiative and that here has never been a requirement from the commission or from DCA that they validate the tool. 

 

Philip also pointed out that the difference between the residential and commercial case for auto-generation of the reference design is that the residential marginally exists and that it doesn’t completely exist for the commercial tool. This is due to the auto-generation test for the commercial are focused on Appendix G, Chapter 11.

 

Jonathan asked about building code requirements unique to Florida. 

 

Rob V. also confirmed that there is error checking on the proposed house rules, some of these need to be more unique to Florida.

Philip confirmed that solar-thermal energy hot water systems are treated differently in Florida, Florida has its own regulations and certifications and everything else for solar-thermal hot water systems. Philip volunteered to make those algorithms available to other tool vendors.

 

Mo suggested that the Workgroup members agree that the criteria in 07-003 are an option with some modifications.

 

Jonathan acknowledged that there is some agreement regarding the residential side and directed the conversation to discuss the commercial side.

Philip claimed that there are a lot of good tests available in ASHRAE Standard 140 and in the COMNET modeling and procedures.

 

Swami supported Philip’s statement about ASHRAE Standard 140 modeling accuracy.

 

During the webinar, some of the Workgroup members noted that they were no longer able to see the PowerPoint presentation. Jonathan no longer had control over the slides.  Jonathan suggested he read the items off his slides instead of waiting for individuals to find and download the slides. 

 

Ann mentioned that there are Florida specific criteria, especially in residential that whereby we give credits for things. Ann asked whether these programs need to address those criteria, or whether it should be allowed to be a market factor of options available to the user.

 

Philip suggested that if the codes states that users can claim credit, then all tool should allow the user to claim that credit. Specific situations, such as ceiling fans, are handled in slightly different ways in the current Florida code software. Philip can provide the algorithms that describe how those are handled.

 

Jonathan concluded the webinar by suggesting a next webinar date of October 11, 2011.  The group decided that the date is tentative and may be moved to a later date.   Jonathan agrees to compile minutes for the meeting.  He also gives a brief outline of the next action items which include developing a draft of the manual. The webinar concluded at 3.08PM.