In MPR, all LEED certified project must commit to sharing with USGBC and/or GBCI all available actual whole-project energy data for a period of a least 5 year. I assume building energy performance for LEED certified project will be verified by USGBC/GBCI based on actual energy data and energy simulation result. What will happen if energy simulation result not correspond with actual energy data for a LEED certified project? Will this verification affect the LEED award?

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Jean Marais

b.i.g. Bechtold DesignBuilder Expert

LEEDuser Basic Member

581 thumbs up

Tue, 07/10/2012 - 10:24

No. And if the simulation matched the simulation results something would be jippoed. ;-) For your information there is a M&V stradegy that means you calibrate your simulation to measured data and for this you would use the same year's annual weather. The whole building simulation for EAp2 results is just a measure for building performance against a baseline and is hypothetical.

Steven Er

LEEDuser Basic Member

8 thumbs up

Wed, 07/11/2012 - 07:29

Hi Jean I am not sure I understand you correctly. Are you saying USGBC/GBCI does not expect the simulated energy in EAp2/c1 to reflect actual energy? Credit taken in EAp2/c1 will not be challenged or revoked if simulated energy in EAp2/c1 has differ significantly from actual energy?

Jean Marais

b.i.g. Bechtold DesignBuilder Expert

LEEDuser Basic Member

581 thumbs up

Wed, 07/11/2012 - 09:53

Waht does significantly mean? DegreeDay variation is over 40% from year to year. This means using averaged weather data for energy simulation wil have a massive difference from using real data from a specific year. Don't think too much about it. Actual values can only roughly be compared to simulated values. I would expect up to 20% deviation. This is could even be the case for measured data from year to year.

Marcus Sheffer

LEED Fellow

7group / Energy Opportunities

LEEDuser Expert

4454 thumbs up

Wed, 07/11/2012 - 21:20

USGBC is gathering this data to see how certified project actually perform. A comparison to the projected energy use from the model can produce some useful information. But they are primarily interested in comparing the actual building performance to similar actual building energy performance not just the modeling results. Credit will not even be questioned by USGBC.

Steven Er

LEEDuser Basic Member

8 thumbs up

Thu, 07/12/2012 - 03:32

I agree weather data is one of the factor that determine the accuracy of simulated energy to actual energy data. How about input data in a typical energy simulation? I understand that most of the regulated load input can be verified through submitted design document but not non-regulated load input. Project (especially project that have high ratio of non-regulated load) may get benefit in EAp2/c1 by reporting non-regulated load that result the better outcome. I wondering the verification on non-regulated load by USGBC/GBCI. Any idea? Shall this be verified through the actual energy data?

Marcus Sheffer

LEED Fellow

7group / Energy Opportunities

LEEDuser Expert

4454 thumbs up

Thu, 07/12/2012 - 12:50

It is always a good idea to follow up your models to see how well you did. Every chance we get we follow up our models and compare them to actual and analyze the energy performance. With that said USGBC will not perform any verification of any of the modeling results. They are gathering the data to enable them to look at LEED project performance in aggregate, not individually.

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