Building Energy Simulation Benefits - Optimize Your Project

Written by bimboss | Nov 25, 2025 10:50:37 AM

What do you get when you apply these momentous ways of building energy simulation for your upcoming million-dollar project?

Nowadays, 42% of the energy generated (according to the US EIA) is consumed by the building sector, with the major consumers being the Residential, commercial, and manufacturing sectors. As we see the energy consumption per capita figures for the US, we can see that in the 1990’s, ECPC is 11687.2 and in 2005, ECPC is 13635.7. The total population of US is 323.1 million, so it requires about 629696.70 more kWh to manage the present-day energy demand. Commercialization immediately primes confrontation with increasing energy demand (Electricity and Fossil fuel), Increase the carbon footprint, impecunious air quality, and usability of virgin material, but our sustainable approach is in the direction of minimizing all the effect of commercialization. As per EIA (U.S. Energy Information Administration) survey report, Total 472 E+9 metric tons CO2 had generated in the 2015 by electricity generation. One kW electricity has generated 800 gm of CO2 in the environment, and if we can approach to save only one kWh in our building, we can save 2 kW in the generation plant. U S Department of Energy Efficiency adorns an intent that describes primary energy saving potential and retrofit potential. In the primary saving potential, target to save 4.4 E+15 BTU/Year and in the retrofit potential, target to save 12 E+15 BTU/Year up to 2030.

This article will provide you with the elementary understanding of building energy simulation, and if you think to apply the energy simulation, how much you get.

Benefits of Energy Simulation

We have seen many benefits of energy simulation in the building HVAC design, but in this article, we will discuss the financial and design criteria that help you all to improve building energy potential. These include:

# Tax Deduction

In the US for commercial building type, tax deduction of $1.80 per square foot is available to owner of new or existing buildings who placed (1) interior lighting; (2) building envelope, or (3) heating, cooling, ventilation, or hot water systems that reduce the building’s total energy and power cost by 50% or more in comparison to a building meeting minimum requirements set by ASHRAE Standard 90.1-2007.

Table 1 Details of Tax Deductions
Keynotes Statement under 179D Federal Tax Deduction Credit
Fully Qualifying Property Partially Qualifying Property
Building Envelope (Includes Wall, Roof, and Glass) Building Lighting Load (LPD) Building HVAC Load (System, and Plant)
Saving Requirement 50% Whole Building Energy and Cost Saving 16.66 Energy and Cost Saving 16.66 Energy and Cost Saving 16.66 Energy and Cost Saving
Tax Deduction Tax Deduction up to $1.80 Sq. ft. Tax Deduction up to $0.60 Sq. ft. Tax Deduction up to $0.60 Sq. ft. Tax Deduction up to $0.60 Sq. ft.

# Energy Cost Saving

Install the efficient building envelope, lighting system, and HVAC system in the building, and then we get results in terms of reduced energy consumption. Let's take an example of an efficient lighting system. In the market, mainly four types of lighting fixtures are available, which are mentioned in Table 2.

Table 2 Comparison Lumens vs. Watts
Lumens Level 450 800 1100 1600
Dimmer to Brighter
Standard Incandescent 40 W 60 W 75 W 100 W
Halogen Incandescent 29 W 43 W 53 W 72 W
CFLs 10 W 13 W 16 W 20 W
LEDs 5 W 10 W 15 W 19 W
To cater 1600 lumens requirement, we have four choices, and If we install LEDs in the space, total lighting energy consumption will be less as compare to other fixture along with better luminous efficacy, Life, color temperature, and color rendering. Payback year of efficient system will be 2-3 year.

# Maintenance Cost Saving

In my earlier point I wrote about the energy cost savings and how we can implement them in an extensive manner to reduce the cost of million-dollar projects. This point is based on product quality and life cycle. Most of the LED replacement lamps are rated to last 25,000 hours or more before they lose 30% of their initial light output. Correlatively, if we install a variable frequency drive HVAC system instead of a conservative HVAC system, we can save more maintenance costs.

# Reduce the R&D Cost

Research and Development (R&D) costing refers to the investigation movement a designer conducts to improve building operation, optimize passive architecture of buildings, and reduce the building's environmental impact, i.e. microclimate effect, heat island effect, and thermal massing effect.

Following things we can do in the simulation will reduce the R&D cost. These include:

  • How much daylighting level is required in the particular space?
  • How does adequate daylighting reduce the energy consumption?
  • How does insulation reduce the heat load, and what is the payback year for insulation?
  • How does single-glazed and double-glazed glass behave in the building?
  • What is the effect of building schedules, occupancy density, lighting power density,
  • equipment power density on building energy consumption?
  • How do infiltration and exfiltration affect the building heat load?
  • What is the accurate volume flow required for a particular space?
  • How much is the energy consumption when building runs in an actual environment?
  • What is the accurate HVAC sizing to get lower energy consumption?
  • What is the actual life cycle cost of building?
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