Progetto SIMEA - Automatica - Università degli Studi di Padova

SIMEA Stato dell’arte energetica degli edifici
1.2.38. PowerDomus
71
Doc.No 20100610.SIMEA.MR.03
Versione 1
PowerDomus is a whole- building simulation tool for
analysis of both thermal comfort and energy use. It has been
developed to model coupled heat and moisture transfer in
buildings when subjected to any kind of climate conditions, i.e.,
considering both vapor diffusion and capillary migration. Its
models predict temperature and moisture content profiles within
multi-layer walls for any time step and temperature and relative
humidity for each zone, by using the finite-volume approach and
the mathematical method developed by Mendes et al. (2002).
The use of this method avoids numerical oscillations, since it
keeps the discrete equations strongly coupled between themselves, preventing the occurrence of physically
unrealistic behaviour when time step is increased and producing a numerically stable method, which is very
suitable 11 to be used in building yearly energy simulation programs. Integrated simulation of HVAC
systems can be performed for both direct and indirect expansion systems.
PowerDomus allows users to visualize the sun path and inter-buildings shading effects and provides
reports with graphical results of zone temperature and relative humidity, PMV and PPD, thermal loads
statistics, temperature and moisture content within user-selectable walls/roofs, surface vapor fluxes and
daily-integrated moisture sorption/ desorption capacity.
On-off and PID control strategies can be applied to individual heaters or DX-systems and 1-minute
time intervals for schedules can be considered all over.
For the floor, the Dirichlet conditions for temperature and moisture content at the lower soil surface or
adiabatic and impermeable conditions for deeper surfaces can be considered. There is also the possibility to
read temperature and moisture content data generated by the Solum 3-D Simulation model (Santos and
Mendes, 2003), which provides spatial distribution of temperature and moisture content in soils for each
user-defined time sample.
PowerDomus has been conceived to be a very user- friendly software in order to stimulate a larger
number of users to use building simulation software. It has been developed in the C++ language under C++
Builder environment using a 3-D OpenGL graphical interface and it is available on the PC platform under
Windows 2000 and XP operating systems.