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What batch pre/post processing tools are there for EnergyPlus?

asked 2014-09-30 22:43:26 -0500

updated 2015-07-11 09:46:20 -0500

I'm curious to hear what others are using to launch larger sets of simulations with E+. Several times I've done a study with the same idf, but run in many locations and I always think there must be a better way than manually launching and extracting results. I've heard of JEPlus, but never used it. I'm also particularly interested to know whats out there that runs on Mac. Any pros or cons of different batch tools?

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1

@HayesZirnhelt. You may want to tag this question with things like 'energyplus', 'parametrics', and 'mac ' or 'mac os' so that folks who subscribe to these tags (i.e., mark them as interesting) are notified.

__AmirRoth__'s avatar __AmirRoth__  ( 2014-10-01 10:17:54 -0500 )edit

6 Answers

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answered 2019-01-02 05:32:24 -0500

I am using a tool named Smart-Energy.It is developed by ISHRAE (Indian Society of Heating refrigeration & air conditioning engineers).It gives you different graphical reports based on the results generated by energy plus some of them are like

Monthly analysis graphical reports
1. Zone total internal latent heat gain
2. Zone total internal heat gain 3. Zone sensible cooling rate
4. Zone sensible heating rate 5. DX coil total cooling rate
6. Heating coil rate 7. DX Coil total cooling energy
8. Fan electric Consumption 9. Window heat gain energy 10. Window heat loss energy 11. Zone transmitted solar energy 12. Sunlit graph

Hourly analysis graphical reports

  1. Zone outdoor temperature
  2. Zone outdoor relative humdity
  3. Zone mean air temperature
  4. Zone mean radiant temperature
  5. Zone air relative humidity
  6. Zone air humidity ratio
  7. Zone people sensible heat gain
  8. Zone people latent heat gain
  9. Zone equipment total heat gain
  10. Zone light total heat gain
  11. Zone total internal latent heat gain
  12. Zone total internal heat gain
  13. Zone sensible cooling rate
  14. Zone sensible heating rate
  15. DX coil total cooling rate
  16. Heating coil rate
  17. Fan electric Consumption
  18. Windiw heat gain energy
  19. Window heat loss energy
  20. Zone transmited solar energy

288 hours (21st of every month) analysis graphical reports 1. Zone outdoor temperature
2. Zone outdoor relative humdity 3. Zone mean air temperature
4. Zone mean radiant temperature 5. Zone air relative humidity
6. Zone air humidity ratio 7. Zone people sensible heat gain
8. Zone people latent heat gain 9. Zone equipment total heat gain
10. Zone light total heat gain 11. Zone total internal latent heat gain
12. Zone total internal heat gain 13. Zone sensible cooling rate
14. Zone sensible heating rate 15. DX coil total cooling rate
16. Heating coil rate 17. DX Coil total cooling energy
18. Fan electric Consumption 19. Window heat gain energy 20. Window heat loss energy 21. Zone transmitted solar energy

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1

answered 2014-10-15 09:36:48 -0500

The EP-Launch "Group of Input Files" tab can be used to set this up very easily, but that is Windows-only.

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3

answered 2014-10-14 07:52:45 -0500

updated 2017-11-05 08:06:32 -0500

For EnergyPlus output processing, when I need to gather information from tabular reports from a lot of files, I use the current XML output option:

OutputControl:Table:Style,
    XMLandHTML:               !- Column Separator

and a Python script called epXML2CSV.py that reads the XML output from every file in a folder and creates a CSV file that can then be imported into a spreadsheet program like Excel. It reads only parts of the tabular report that you want based on list in a text files. The script and example file are at:

link to epXML2CSV GitHub repo

Suggestions on how to improve the script are welcome.

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@JasonGlazer this would be a good candidate for GitHub.

MatthewSteen's avatar MatthewSteen  ( 2015-08-13 17:16:04 -0500 )edit
1

@MatthewSteen just added a Github repo

JasonGlazer's avatar JasonGlazer  ( 2017-11-05 08:07:00 -0500 )edit
3

answered 2014-10-02 08:50:30 -0500

Archmage's avatar

I have used OpenStudio's low level IDF Workspace methods called from a series of ruby scripts (see 179d calculator). For a large study and if you don't want any sort of GUI involved, it works pretty well. The ruby bindings i OpenStudio are powerful way to leverage ruby language. With IDF Workspace methods, you can work with any IDF you may have created elsewhere and are not limited to those parts of EnergyPlus that OpenStudio has flushed out for use with its GUIs. It is pretty much brute force when it comes to modifying IDF objects at this lowest level, but it isn't difficult if you know exactly what you want in the IDF. There is a way to call a run manager from the scripts to help manage queuing up and executing all the simulations. You can query the sqlite database to collect results.

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6

answered 2014-10-01 16:44:44 -0500

updated 2014-10-01 19:00:13 -0500

Hayes, below is a brief summery of how you could do this in PAT.

Below is a screenshot of PAT with an OpenStudio measure and two EnergyPlus measures. Among other things, the first measure associates an epw file with model. In this use case it is only useful for the epw, because the changes made in the actual model will be overwritten by the next measure. This isn't published yet but I can email a copy to you.

image description

The next screenshot shows a measure I made as a proof of concept that lets you inject geometry from an OSM file into an external IDF file. The external IDF file is then fed into the run workflow in place of the IDF generated by OpenStudio. If you don't check the box to use the OSM geometry, then the result is passing the entire un-touched external IDF into the workflow. This measure is on BCL

image description

If your locations are different enough then you probably want to make a simple EnergyPlus measure to update your design day information, maybe along with water main and ground temps. Or if you have changed these elsewhere, you can make design alternatives where you pair the correct IDF up with correct epw. I showed the PV measure in the workflow just an example. You could replace this measure with one that alters site information stored within the IDF file.

This same workflow would work fine on the Analysis Framework spreadsheet, but with that or even with EC2 in PAT you do need to make some minor alterations. The measures are pointing to local files on my computer. When the measures run on the cloud, it won't see those files. The best way to solve that would be to create a "resources" folder within the measure for any files you might refer to. If the files are within the measure they would go up to the severs and would be available when the measures are run. The Xcel EDA Tarrif measure demonstrates this.

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answered 2014-10-01 10:15:06 -0500

Are you looking to actually run the simulations on your Mac or do you just want a Mac client to run simulations elsewhere, e.g., on the cloud?

Either way, JEPlus will do this. And it's a Java application so it will run on Macs or pretty much anything else (Raspberry Pi?). You could try OpenStudio, specifically the new Analysis Framework which is spreadsheet driven and will run things locally or on EC2. OpenStudio has the advantage of supporting "higher-order" measures in addition to simpler parametrics like weather files. Another option is the new web-based framework Apidae (apidaelabs.net).

I am not sure what else is available for Macs. There are probably more web-based options. Perhaps others will chime in.

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Thanks Amir. OpenStudio is a great option for this in general but doesn't work well if you've created the model in a text editor without the openstudio interface. JEplus sounds like what I'm looking for, but is not using the latest version of E+ so wont run my idfs (last time I checked anyway).

In this case I'm not needing to run this on the cloud just have done a few studies recently where I run 8-10 weather files then extract particular results manually to a spreadsheet, and I've thought someone must have written a simple script to both launch all these and extract specific results.

Hayes Zirnhelt's avatar Hayes Zirnhelt  ( 2014-10-01 10:27:45 -0500 )edit
2

Hmmmmm. We're working on the EnergyPlus to OpenStudio thing, I recognize that it's a problem right now. For something simple like this you may want to look at Clayton Miller's python framework or maybe Eppy (EnergyPlus python). Or you could just script something up yourself ... :)

__AmirRoth__'s avatar __AmirRoth__  ( 2014-10-01 10:41:14 -0500 )edit

Hayes, I can offer some options to use OpenStudio directly with IDF files. I'll write a detailed answer when I have more time today. The basic approach is to use the measure below. If you uncheck use "Merge Geometry From OpenStudio Model into Source IDF File?" then you get the IDF file just as it is. Then you need a measure to swap out the weather file, and I assume in your case ddy data as well. Inject OSM Geometry into an External IDF

If you just want to script you can do this in an easier way where you don't need any measures, just load IDF and OpenStudio can feed it into EnergyPlus with your specified weather file.

David Goldwasser's avatar David Goldwasser  ( 2014-10-01 11:24:54 -0500 )edit

Thanks David. This sounds like a great solution, at least to streamlining the launching part. Is there a measure I could then apply to extract a specific output (eg. cooling energy) from all runs into one spreadsheet? I suppose if I do this in PAT for most studies the output I'm interested in would be reported all on the same page.

Hayes Zirnhelt's avatar Hayes Zirnhelt  ( 2014-10-01 14:03:46 -0500 )edit
1

I second @Amir Roth when he mentioned Eppy. Eppy will help in pre-processing only though, but it's very useful to manipulate idf files such as copying stuff, extracting, or changing. I'd also look into ExcalibBEM from hydro quebec: it's a GUI for GenOpt, will help you run parametric and/or opti studies, and will display some results in real time.

Julien Marrec's avatar Julien Marrec  ( 2014-10-02 09:11:28 -0500 )edit

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Asked: 2014-09-30 22:43:26 -0500

Seen: 2,380 times

Last updated: Jan 02 '19