| Environmental Analysis and Simulation |
Shadows and Reflections
Display the sun’s position and path relative to the model at any date, time, and location. View shadows over the model, isolate individual shadows from selected objects, and assign colors in order to differentiate the effects of different objects or buildings. See how sunlight enters through windows and moves within a space. Tag objects in the model as solar reflectors and track movement of reflections across the site.
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Shading Design
A wizard helps you design shading devices to meet complex shading requirements. It can also generate a shape to optimally shade a window for any specified period. Generate cutting planes that follow the path of the sun in order to cut profiles and produce site solar envelopes. Once you model a complex shading system, more quickly calculate how much solar radiation hits any part of the window or over time.
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Solar Analysis
Visualize incident solar radiation on windows and surfaces, and show the differential incident solar radiation calculated over any period. Take advantage of site overshadowing to treat different parts of the facade. Compare incident gains during different seasons, more clearly showing variations in solar resources available to the building at times when heating or cooling is required. Calculate solar availability over the spaces around buildings and in highly overshadowed urban sites.
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Photovoltaic Array Sizing and Load Matching
Calculate the amount of solar radiation falling on any object, along with shading and reflection percentages. Combine this information with total annual radiation to help determine the best location and orientation for solar panels. Calculate the solar radiation incident on any solar collector and estimate its likely energy production throughout the year.
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Lighting Design
Calculate daylight factors and illuminance levels at any point in the model or over the analysis grid. Once you calculate daylight factors in your model, use the advanced daylighting features to help determine potential savings due to daylight-linked lighting.
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Right-to-Light
Analyze site projection angles, assess obstructions, calculate vertical sky components for any point or surface, and visualize the no-sky line in any space. Generate angled test planes from each window or facade you are studying, or physically project and color exactly the parts of a structure that are infringing.
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Acoustic Analysis
Acoustic analysis options range from simple statistical reverberation times to sophisticated particle analysis and ray tracing techniques.
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Thermal Analysis
Calculate heating and cooling loads for models with any number of zones and with any type of geometry. Assign detailed material properties to all objects and annual hourly operational schedules to occupancy, internal gains, infiltration, and individual items of equipment.
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Ventilation and Airflow
Generate geometry and analysis grids and export them directly into computational fluid dynamics (CFD) tools. Complete your calculations and import results back into Ecotect Analysis for display within the context of the original model. Choose from a variety of visualization and presentation options, or view volumetrically as you move around in 3D. Use the same process to calculate airflow both through and around buildings and complex urban environments.
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Whole Building Energy, Water, and Carbon Analysis
Customers who add subscription to Autodesk Ecotect Analysis can get integrated access* to Autodesk Green Building Studio web-based service for whole building analysis of energy, water, and carbon emissions.
Energy and Carbon Results
The engineering results pages on the Autodesk Green Building Studio web-based service provide extensive information on a building’s energy performance. They also offer resources to help compare the relative energy costs of building design scenarios at the conceptual design stage.
Whole Building Energy Analysis
Help to determine and reduce a virtual building’s total energy use and carbon footprint. Break down annual energy use, including all electricity and fuel, into lighting, HVAC, and other equipment, with hourly analysis simulations that use the DOE-2.2 simulation engine. See breakdown and display of energy use in graphical format and percentages associated with each category in a few clicks of your mouse.
Carbon Emission Reporting
The web service reports on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions for nearly all aspects of the building, including on-site fuel use and emissions at power plants that supply electricity to the building. The analysis also summarizes the power plants that generate electricity for the electric grid that serves the building by fuel type.
Water Usage and Cost Evaluation
Get a summary of the estimated water use in and outside the building, based on the number of people and building type. Water usage analysis enables you to apply a variety of water savings measures, including more efficient fixtures, water catchments, and native vegetation. Ecotect Analysis can tell you the potential LEED credits available for these measures.
Photovoltaic Potential
Get a high-level summary of your building's photovoltaic potential. Analyze every exterior surface on your building to determine how much electricity photovoltaic panels could generate.
ENERGY STAR Scoring
Each building design receives a United States Environmental Protection Agency ENERGY STAR® score. The ENERGY STAR score is the basis for the Architecture 2030 goals for carbon and fossil fuel reduction.
Daylighting
Every analysis details your qualification for LEED daylighting credit. Get a summary of each room’s glaze factor calculations to determine what actions you can take to increase eligibility for LEED daylight credits.
Project Locating
A Google Maps™ view displays weather stations, distances, and land and water features, so you can precisely locate your project.
Weather Pinpointing
Designers can simulate weather associated with a location using an extensive collection of hourly weather data (U.S. and Europe), available within a few kilometers of any building site.
Detailed Weather Analysis
Review extensive, easy-to-read weather reports for your project site, including wind speed and direction for any time period.
Wind Energy Potential
The software can calculate the amount of electricity a 15-foot wind turbine can generate each year, based on a selected weather location.
Natural Ventilation Potential
Figure out how much mechanical cooling the current building design requires. Then, estimate the number of hours the current design could use outdoor air to cool the building naturally. More quickly determine if mechanical cooling is necessary if your site is in a mild climate.
Analyzing Design Alternatives
The Design Alternative (DA) feature on the Autodesk Green Building Studio web service, assists you in determining variations that will help improve energy efficiency. This powerful feature helps you to make significant design decisions more quickly.
File Download Formats
Interoperability between Autodesk Ecotect Analysis, building information modeling (BIM) tools, and other software programs is provided with various file download formats, including:
- gbXML
- VRML
- DOE-2
- EnergyPlus
- Weather File (binary)
- Weather File (csv)
VRML is a 3D model that shows what the gbXML export has extracted from your project. It can be useful for establishing a good representation of the whole building.
* Customers who purchase a Subscription for their Autodesk Ecotect Analysis license can access the Autodesk® Green Building Studio® web-based service for the duration of their Subscription term in order to conduct whole building energy, water, and carbon analysis. |
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