Introduction:
Once the Insight analysis is complete, you can view the results and explore the opportunities to improve the energy performance of your design in the Insight interface. The Insight interface displays numerical results as well as an interactive model view that helps you visualize the heating loads, cooling loads, and the PV potential of the surfaces in your model. And you can customize the Insight interface to display the results in the units and the reporting format that you prefer.
In this exercise, you will learn how to:
- Access results in the Insight Interface
- Set Insight Preferences for an Insight
- Interact with the Insight Interface
- Visualize Heating/Cooling Loads and PV Potential in Insight
This video shows the workflow for accessing the Energy Analysis results in Insight.
Workflow Steps:
Open the Insight Interface
- Once the Insight analysis is complete, go to the Analyze tab and click Optimize to access the results in the Insight interface.
Set Preferences for an Insight
- Click Back to Insight to exit this specific project.
- On the right panel, select Settings and change the following:
- Default units: Imperial.
- Roll-up: Energy Use Intensity (EUI)
- Sort the Model widgets by importance: Yes
- Currency & Utility Rates: select USD ($) from the drop down menu.
When you return to your project, note that the values, ranges, and units will reflect your preferences.
Explore the Insight Interface
- Select the tile for your project to reopen it.
You will see your energy model as well as a range of factors that impact your building’s energy cost and performance:
- The Large Model Viewer shows the energy model submitted to insight, as well as a Gauge and Location tile.
- The Gauge displays the energy cost or performance; it toggles between Annual Cost ($) and Energy Use Intensity (EUI) when you click on it.
- The Location Tile shows project location and contains weather station information.
- The Benchmark Comparison displays the mean Annual Cost or EUI (depending on settings) value as well as the range of potential values given your assumptions in the model. It also shows how your design’s current performance stacks up against industry benchmarks such as ASHRAE 90.1 and Architecture 2030 targets for this project.
- The Model History tracks all changes made to your model and impact.
- The Factors allow you to quickly explore the impact of different design decisions for key drivers of performance. Factors are ordered from greatest to least impact, and this could be overridden in the Settings dialog.
Visualize Heating/Cooling Loads and PV Potential in Insight
- Go to the Visualize drop-down menu and select:
- PV Analysis to display a visualization of the solar potential of the surfaces in your model.
- Heating Loads or Cooling Loads to display a visualization of the heating and cooling loads for each of the zones in your model.
- Click on an area in the visualization to see the computed values for that area.
More detail about the PV Potential and the factors that affect it are covered in Lesson on Solar Measurements & Strategies.
Exercise:
You will use the same settings from the previous exercise, so you do not need to download the project again. However, if you played around with it some on your own, you might want to re-download it so you can start fresh.
Follow the steps outlined below:
- Open the model “Audubon_Energy Code Baseline.rvt” in Revit (2017 or above)
- On the ‘Manage’ tab, select the Location tool from the ‘Project Location’ group
- Select ‘Internet Mapping Service’ in ‘Define Location by:’(note that you need to be connected to the internet and logged on to access data. If you don’t see a map with a list of Weather Stations, you are not connected to the service.)
- Enter ‘Columbus, Ohio’ for the address, and select weather station ‘42407’.
- On the ‘Analyze’ tab, select ‘Generate’ to create the energy model and generate results.
- Choose the option to ‘Update Energy Analytical Model’
- Click ‘Optimize’ from the same toolbar to view analytical results with Insight.
- In the Insight main page (click ‘Back to Insight’ if currently viewing model results), select the Settings gear icon next to Model Comparison, and choose the following settings:
- Default units: Imperial
- Roll-up type: Energy Use Intensity (EUI)
- Model widget sort by importance: Yes
- Currency and Utility Rates: USD ($)
- Select your project from the list (models with new results are usually at the top) to open the results page
- Click on the Gauge to toggle the results between Energy Use Intensity (EUI) and Energy Cost
- Navigate through the ‘Visualize’ options to see Heating, Cooling, and Photovoltaic energy results
