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U.S. Department of Energy Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy
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New Features

The summary below lists the new and improved features found in EnergyPlus 7.0.

General

  • Significant speed increases, most simulations see up to 20% reduction in execution time, depending on features used (also speed increase for many AirflowNetwork simulations and large models with radiant systems–see below).

Datasets

  • New input data sets for HVAC equipment performance for rooftop packaged air conditioners and heat pumps (see DXCoolingCoil.idf and RooftopPackagedHeatPump.idf).
  • Extended the library of refrigerant data to include R407a and superheated CO2 properties (see FluidPropertiesRefData.idf).
  • New input data set for exhaust-fired chiller heater model (see ExhaustFiredChiller.idf).

Input

  • Steam is now a "built-in" fluid property.
  • Zone Floor Area can be an input—overrides the calculated amount.

Windows and Daylighting

  • International Glazing Data Base (IGDB) full spectral data can be used directly.

Zone and Surface Models

  • Shadowing Model new options: legacy "convex" Weiler-Atherton or Sutherland-Hodgman (more robust for non-convex surfaces).
  • New input problem checks for surface geometry including: convexity, collinear vertices, planar surfaces, and flipped floors/roofs. For flipped floors/roofs, a fix is attempted.
  • Conduction Transfer Function model revised to improve modeling of mass-less material layers.
  • OtherSideCoefficients model extended to provide controlled surface outside temperature with schedule and limits.
  • Design day weather data generation procedures upgraded for clear sky model and wet-bulb temperature profiles.
  • Conduction Finite Difference heat transfer model now includes options for solution method and to control node spatial resolution, relaxation factor, and convergence criteria.
  • Improved convergence checks for initial warmup days.

Natural and Mechanical Ventilation

  • AirflowNetwork solver enhanced for speed.
  • Consolidated outdoor air inputs in HVAC models to common design object wherever outdoor air rates are specified.
  • New proportional control for CO2-based demand controlled ventilation.
  • New mixing object for door openings into refrigerated zones.
  • New mechanical ventilation controls based on ASHRAE Standard 62.1 and CEN 15251.

HVAC and Refrigeration

  • New model for Variable Refrigerant Flow heat pump air conditioning systems.
  • Ideal loads air system model revised to include outdoor air and economizer controls, humidity control, and capacity limits.
  • Plant system and component models revised to improve speed and robustness, model fluid properties as a function of temperature and alternative types of fluid, and better flow control.
  • Glycol mixtures supported in all plant loop components.
  • New dual duct air terminal unit with dedicated outside air system on one duct and cooling on the other duct.
  • New absorption chiller model powered by microturbine generator exhaust.
  • Eliminated redundant input fields in compound HVAC objects.
  • Added maximum limits for supply air temperature leaving air terminal reheat coils.
  • Radiant-based HVAC system models revised for significant speed increase when models have a large number of thermal zones.
  • Low temperature radiant zone HVAC model now includes a "variable off" control mode.
  • Simple chilled water coil model has enhanced autosizing and variable UA for significant improvements in chilled water flow rate calculations.
  • New heat transfer models for buried piping systems include interaction with building slabs and basement walls.
  • Hot water boiler model options for choosing between entering and leaving water temperature as basis in performance curves.
  • New dedicated outdoor air system HVACTemplate object.
  • New HVACTemplate options: static pressure reset fan curve, screw chiller type, economizer dewpoint limit, and unitary system design supply temperatures.
  • New Refrigeration model for cold-storage thermal zones served by refrigeration-based zone units.
  • Refrigeration condensers now can reject heat to a thermal zone.
  • Improved Refrigeration model to compare the available temperature of heat reclaimed from a refrigeration condenser to the temperature needed.
  • Variable speed fan model upgraded to avoid unrealistic leaving temperatures at very low flow rates.

Electrical Systems

  • New model for chemical battery electrical storage.

Controls and User Functions

  • Availability Managers extended to work with selected ZoneHVAC equipment including: window air conditioner, unit heater, unit ventilator, packaged terminal air conditioner, packaged terminal heat pump, and zone water source heat pump.
  • New Setpoint Managers added to: follow outdoor air temperature, follow system node temperature, and follow ground temperature.
  • Improvements made to how zone equipment is controlled when sequencing multiple devices in a single zone.
  • New overcool option for Zone and AirLoop HVAC to control high humidity by shifting down the zone cooling setpoint temperature.
  • Added high humidity control option for air-to-air and water-to-air heat pumps.
  • New EMS actuators and calling point for custom autosizing of input fields in select DX air handling equipment models.
  • New EMS actuators for material surface absorptance properties.
  • New EMS actuators for Variable Refrigerant Flow operating mode and terminal unit part-load ratio.
  • New EMS actuators for ideal loads air system supply temperature and humidity ratio.
  • EnergyPlus Runtime Language extended to include built-in functions for generating random numbers, limited support for minus sign, and built-in variables for zone timestep and current environment period.

Output

  • New thermal comfort reporting based on the adaptive comfort criteria from ASHRAE Standard 55-2010 and CEN 15251.
  • New Sensible Heat Gain Component tabular report.
  • New results in Envelope Summary and Lighting Summary tabular reports.
  • New source energy end use tabular report.

Utilities

  • IDF Editor enhancements include: (1) search and replace any text in a file, (2) easy node name selection based on names, object, field, or recently used, and (3) expanded validity checking.
  • New auxiliary tool generates performance curve coefficients for select HVAC equipment.
  • CSVproc has been reimplemented and is now available as a cross-platform tool.
  • New EPDrawGUI cross-platform replacement of WinEPDraw.
  • New IDFVersionUpdater cross-platform replacement of IDFConverter.
  • Enhanced WeatherConverter with several new features.
  • EP-Launch can start EPDrawGUI, IDFVersionUpdater, and EP-Compare.

Documentation and Guides

  • Documentation has been updated for all documents.

Platforms

  • Windows (XP, Vista, Windows 7) 32 and 64 bit versions.
  • Linux (Ubuntu 9.04 and above, Redhat 5.4 and above) 32 and 64 bit versions.
  • Mac (10.6) 32 and 64 bit versions.
  • EnergyPlus V 7.0 has been tested on all of these platforms.

And many other enhancements and speed improvements throughout.