My research is based on green roof design and I'm using EnergyPlus ecoroof to model my green roof. However, I'm not designing the whole building and have decided to use the prototyping models offered in the EnergyPlus library tool. I'm using secondary school buildings under the Toronto weather climate, but I'm not sure how to validate the heating and cooling loads I'm getting for my simulations.
I found a webpage: https://www.energycodes.gov/development/commercial/prototype_models#90.1, in this source all the prototyping models for all versions (2004, 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016 and 2019) and for all different climate zones along with the html results for each prototyping model of EnergyPlus is provided.
I used Buffalo, NY prototype model which is a climate zone 5A (same as Toronto city) and compared the results of my simulations to the html file provided on the web page for Buffalo city for secondary school (I used version 2013).
I compared only the total energy consumption of the building along with the heating and cooling loads. My results were not the exact values, however they were very close.
I got cooling, 974.65 GJ, and heating, 990.12 GJ for my simulations.
The html file provided on the webpage had cooling: 972.35 GJ and heating 922.42 GJ for the secondary school in Buffalo city version 2013.
I have two questions:
I used IDFversionupdater to update the IDF files as they were older versions, could this be the reason due to the small difference in result values?
Is this a correct method to validate my simulations and model my building base in Toronto city under the Toronto weather climate?
I would really appreciate it if anyone could help me or direct me to a source where I could find information regarding this matter.
Thank you!
Bita
