Question-and-Answer Resource for the Building Energy Modeling Community
 | 1 | initial version |
It's a good thought. I would be tempted to try setting the EIR curve to a flat part-load curve, and leaving the capacity (as a function of temperature) as is. It's not clear to me how to handle the EIR (or COP). Presumably this would tend towards zero as there would be no compressor energy to speak of. I think the major challenge in this kind of work-around would be handling the loop water temperatures, as they would presumably need to be higher than usual to allow hot water coils to add sufficient heat to the supply air without a heat pump. I recommend setting up a model with a 4-pipe system and a separate model with a WSHP system with whatever workaround you are interested in trying. You should be able to determine the heating and cooling energy required from the HW and CHW loops on an hourly basis, and compare this to what happens in the WSHP loop to see if the results are making sense. If you spend enough time with the hourly reports you should be able to test out a few ideas and determine whether your workaround is giving realistic results.
