Denis Dineen 7/8/2010

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Hi,

I have an existing Excel based bottom up model of residential energy demand. The focus is on space and water heating for new dwellings. The model considers 5 dwelling types e.g. one story detached, apartment etc. Dwellings are constructed to one of 4 sets of building regulations introduced in different years on a phased basis and which determine insulation levels etc. The trend in floor areas is also considered. Energy demand is split into main and secondary space heating and main and secondary water heating. Main space and main water heating is provided by boilers of different fuel types and efficiencies. The LEAP model should be able to vary boiler efficiencies, fuel splits, the introduction of more or less stringent energy efficiency regulations and the timing of these regulations, different constuction rates of new dwellings etc.

I am trying to decide the best way of implementing this in LEAP. It ideally requires the facilities of both an activity based useful energy demand analysis and of a stock analysis.
Has anyone tried to build something similar in LEAP before? Did you take the activity analysis approach or the stock analysis approach? Can you tell me of the pro’s and con’s you found in your approach?

Thanks

Tory Clark 7/12/2010
 

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Hi Denis,

We understand that it would be ideal to combine some aspects of the stock analysis with the useful energy activity analysis. Unfortunately this is not possible at this time. We do hope to address this in a future version of LEAP.

For the time being, I recommend doing an activity analysis which makes use of both useful energy analysis and regular activity analysis depending on the type of data being used (e.g useful energy analysis for heating and cooling and regular technology activity analysis for lighting and cooking).

Please find below a tree structure as an example of what this could look like.

NB: It is a .leap file, so be sure to have the most recent version of LEAP (downloadable here: http://tinyurl.com/2b75q87 or within LEAP with the option Help: Check for Updates).

Suggested Housing Structure.leap: http://tinyurl.com/28bl7sl

This example allows for different categories of buildings, such as existing housing and retrofitted housing. In this configuration, both categories of housing could have the same data for some sub-categories (such as appliances) but could have different assumptions other sub-categories (such as hot water heating).

Best,

Tory