First time here? Check out the Help page!

Question-and-Answer Resource for the Building Energy Modeling Community
Get started with the Help page
Ask Your Question
5

Why doesn't the EnergyPlus Environment:Site Wind Speed correspond to the wind speed in the epw weather file if the boundary conditions are the same?

asked 9 years ago

updated 7 years ago

If I compare the EnergyPlus output variable "Environment: Site Wind Speed" to the corresponding epw weather file, the windspeeds don't always correspond ( although δmet, αmet, zmet = δsite, αsite, zsite in the formula Usite=Vmet(δmet/zmet)^αmet * (zsite/δsite)^αsite ) (Formula extracted from: "Local Wind Speeds Calculations" in the Engineering Reference) Does anybody know why? Sometimes the windspeeds do correspond. Sometimes the difference is bigger than 1,5m/s.

Preview: (hide)

Comments

Is your building tall? Might be adjustments for higher speeds on upper floors?

David Goldwasser's avatar David Goldwasser  ( 9 years ago )

If you aren't using hourly time steps, the adjustment to sub-hourly timesteps can affect the output results. Try running again with one timestep per hour and see if you are still getting different outputs.

Neal Kruis's avatar Neal Kruis  ( 9 years ago )

You are correct. It has to do with the sub-hourly timesteps. If I run with one timestep per hour the values correspond. Thank you.

BBel's avatar BBel  ( 9 years ago )

1 Answer

Sort by » oldest newest most voted
4

answered 9 years ago

Bear in mind that environment variables are interpolated so output variable do not match epw hourly value. Could that be the reason? Take a look at http://nrel.github.io/EnergyPlus/Inpu...

Preview: (hide)
link

Your Answer

Please start posting anonymously - your entry will be published after you log in or create a new account.

Add Answer

Training Workshops

Careers

Question Tools

1 follower

Stats

Asked: 9 years ago

Seen: 687 times

Last updated: Jul 16 '15