FullInteriorAndExteriorWithReflections Solar Distribution with Concave Zones in E+

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Another alternative is SurfaceProperty:SolarIncidentInside which allows the incident solar on each surface to be specified with schedules. This would require getting the hourly or timestep values for incident solar flux on each surface from Radiance or another tool capable of doing the full interior solar distribution calculations. Note that this is the final answer for solar incident on the surface after all internal reflected solar. The schedule value is multiplied by the surface solar absorptance to set the absorbed solar for the inside surface heat balance. No further solar distribution is done for surfaces that have one of these.

Hi all,

Are there any updates on this?
I had a similar belief that Radiace´s module eplus_adduvf.exe would overcome E+ shortcoming regarding concave zones and assign surface view factors, thus enabling the FullInteriorExteriorWithReflections solar distribution model.

As Chris points out, it´d be very helpful to find a workaround to this issue in order to run radiant thermal comfort analysis and, additionally, to link E+ surface temperatures with CFD simulations (for spaces like glazed courtyards and atriums).

So far I cannot think of anything else that subdividing the zones - if possible - or downgrading the solar distribution calculation, as has already been mentioned.

Thanks,
Rafael

Hi Chris,

Regarding the Radiance executables and NREL installers issue: OK so the issue there is that when you install OpenStudio, you get a copy of Radiance (installers and libraries) in [path_to_openstudio]\Radiance, but that installer does not modify your environment. We probably should, but we don't. The only piece of OpenStudio that uses Radiance is the Radiance Daylighting Measure, which sets up the proper environment variables from within the measure, so any Radiance bits called from the measure automagically work.

When you installed Radiance with the Radiance installer, that installer copied the very same executables to C:\Radiance (or wherever), AND set up PATH and RAYPATH to point to stuff in .\bin and .\lib respectively, and so it worked.

I'd recommend you install Radiance AND OpenStudio if you wish to use Radiance outside of the OpenStudio radiance measure context.

Regarding the eplus_adduvf operational issues, I'd suggest reaching out to Tianzhen Hong or @macumber here, as they worked on the development of this utility (four years ago).