Issue in Parametric Analysis Tool: "initial capital costs associated with the improvements are $0".

asked 2018-05-22 22:58:13 -0600

updated 2019-02-11 10:03:20 -0600

14100 ●81 ●24 http://bigladdersoftware.com/

I have an OpenStudio model that successfully ran in OpenStudio and then I tried to apply an ECM to my model in the Parametric Analysis Tool. When using the PAT I first downloaded and added the OpenStudioResults as an OpenStudio Measure. I then downloaded the "Reduce Lighting by Percent" measure and added it to the OpenStudio Measures.

I put the following setting for the Lighting Measure:

$C:\fakepath\Screen Shot 2018-05-22 at 11.48.09 PM.png$ .

After running the measure with my baseline model and making sure the OpenStudioResults measure is being used as well, the run fails. There are 0 warnings and 0 errors. The only thing I see when I expand the window is the model's "Initial Condition" and the model's "final condition" and this statement: "initial capital costs associated with the improvements are $0".

Does anyone know what this means or why this is making my run fail? This is the link to the file that I am running: here

I have a project due in two days and I really need to figure this issue out.

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The default cost argument values for the reduce lighting by percentage measure are setup not to add any cost. This is reflected in your screenshot. I don't think the cost is related to the cost, but it is odd that your baseline model runs, and the one with the measure applied does not.

Can you look at the eplusout.err file and provide some details on severe and fatal errors? Also are there any warning measures along with the initial and final condition for the measure.

David Goldwasser ( 2018-05-22 23:42:45 -0600 )edit

Hi David,

Thank you for your assistance. My eplusout.err file has 95 warnings but 0 severe errors and 0 fatal errors. I tried taking a screenshot of the err file but I was not able to upload them here. This is a like to the screenshots: https://drive.google.com/drive/folder...

There were no warning measures along with the initial and final conditions. It just states the number of watts used in the initial conditions and then the reduced number of watts used in the final conditions.

Valentina Rappa ( 2018-05-23 01:32:00 -0600 )edit

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answered 2018-05-23 03:18:54 -0600

Julien Marrec

29676 ●94 ●75 http://www.effibem.com/

updated 2018-05-24 08:15:21 -0600

E+ completed successfully according to the screenshots of your eplusout.err you uploaded to google drive, so I'm pretty sure this is an error in the reporting stuff, likely from something divided by zero or infinity, or perhaps you have non-sanitized names for one of your measure option names or design alternative names.

It seems that you're using OpenStudio 1.14.0, and I definitely recall hitting and reporting such problems in the past with PAT as highlighted by the issue I link to below (they have been fixed since them).

Here's what you can try:

Apply the Reduce Lighting Loads by Percentage but do NOT apply the OpenStudio Results Measure, see if that works (see issue#2670)
Ensure you don't use any special characters including any of $ . € £ in either the measure option name nor the design alternative names. (See issue#2673)
Worst case, try with the latest OpenStudio 2.5.1

For the record, I downloaded your model, an ran it with the Reduce Lighting Loads by Percentage and the OpenStudio Results measure inside the OpenStudio Application (not PAT) version 2.5.1 and it worked. I'd have tried with PAT, but it's still not available on Linux...

Edit:

Try removing all special characters from your OSM model. Namely one material and one window material:

C1 Concrete Precast Panel 10" => C1 Concrete Precast Panel 10in
Double pane with ½” air space R=2.04 => Double pane with 0.5in air space R=2.04,

There is definitely something wrong with the user's model itself, meaning something that doesn't please PAT (it's a PAT bug! I've filed an issue on OpenStudio-PAT here), the run fails due to ASCII to UTF8 conversion. I think the ½ is really the guilty one.

Here's what the datapoint's run.log shows at the end:

[15:44:29.401331 DEBUG] Passing measure OpenStudioResults of type ModelMeasure
[15:44:29.401359 INFO] Finished applying OpenStudio measures.
[15:44:29.401369 DEBUG] Communicating measure output attributes to the output adapter
[15:44:33.570363 ERROR] Found error in state 'os_measures' with message ["\"\\xE2\" from ASCII-8BIT to UTF-8:/home/julien/Software/Others/OpenStudio-PAT/depend/OpenStudio-server/gems/gems/openstudio-workflow-1.3.2/lib/openstudio/workflow/util/model.rb:81:in `write'\n/home/julien/Software/Others/OpenStudio-PAT/depend/OpenStudio-server/gems/gems/openstudio-workflow-1.3.2/lib/openstudio/workflow/util/model.rb:81:in `<<'\n/home/julien/Software/Others/OpenStudio-PAT/depend/OpenStudio-server/gems/gems/openstudio-workflow-1.3.2/lib/openstudio/workflow/util/model.rb:81:in `block in save_osm'\n/home/julien/Software/Others/OpenStudio-PAT/depend/OpenStudio-server/gems/gems/openstudio-workflow-1.3.2/lib/openstudio/workflow/util/model.rb:81:in `open'\n/home/julien/Software/Others/OpenStudio-PAT/depend/OpenStudio-server/gems/gems/openstudio-workflow-1.3.2/lib/openstudio/workflow/util/model.rb:81:in `save_osm'\n/home/julien/Software/Others/OpenStudio-PAT/depend/OpenStudio-server/gems/gems/openstudio-workflow-1.3.2/lib/openstudio/workflow/jobs/run_os_measures.rb:60:in `perform'\n/home/julien/Software/Others/OpenStudio-PAT ...

(more)

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So I was tried following your steps, but it all still failed. Worse case scenario, I can run the ECM in OpenStudio as you had done and see what the EUI is and compare that to my baseline EUI in order to see my savings %, correct?

So I would just be manually doing the work that PAT does when you run an ECM. For my class project, I just need to present the savings so I think this might be a simple workaround if PAT won't work for me. Would you agree?

Valentina Rappa ( 2018-05-23 08:03:33 -0600 )edit

See my edit. Try removing special characters in your material names and let me know if that works. Otherwise, yes, if you don't have a lot of design alternatives, you can run them manually to get your savings.

Julien Marrec ( 2018-05-23 08:21:49 -0600 )edit

I was never using special characters in the material names so I won't be able to try that out, but my only concern now is that I was planning on showing the cost savings that we tied to each ECM. If I run the ECMs on OpenStudio and look at the OpenStudioReuslts page I wont see any information on cost savings or just the cost in general, would I? This is something that I think I am expected to present for my project, but I guess I won't be able to find this information from the OpenStudioResults output, right?

Valentina Rappa ( 2018-05-23 08:43:07 -0600 )edit

You did use special characters in two materials like I wrote in the edit, namely '½' and ".

Julien Marrec ( 2018-05-23 08:50:22 -0600 )edit

Oh okay, the only measure that I have been selecting and running on PAT on my computer is the lighting measure. For this measure, it fails and I have not been using special characters for the names. Those other measure names that you are seeing are past measures that were run by another student in my class. I have only been working with the "reduce lighting by percentage" measure. So for that measure, it is still failing in PAT with no special characters in the name.

Valentina Rappa ( 2018-05-23 08:55:05 -0600 )edit

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Issue in Parametric Analysis Tool: "initial capital costs associated with the improvements are $0".

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Issue in Parametric Analysis Tool: "initial capital costs associated with the improvements are $0".