Origins of analysis methods used to design high-performance commercial buildings: Solar energy analysis

Abstract

This study reviews the origins of the analysis methods used to design high-performance commercial buildings. This study focuses on the origins of the analysis methods used in solar thermal, passive solar, and solar photovoltaic analysis software, developed in the United States and Canada, using a new comprehensive genealogy chart. This historical analysis is important because it gives readers a better understanding of the fundamentals of the analysis methods. The origins of the analysis methods of whole-building energy and daylighting simulation programs were reviewed in other works (Oh and Haberl 2015a, 2015b).

Nomenclature

5P	=	Five-Parameter Array Performance model
DHW	=	domestic hot water
FC	=	F-Chart method
MPT	=	Modified Power Temperature Coefficient model
PASOLE	=	Passive Solar Energy program
PT	=	Power Temperature Coefficient model
PV	=	photovoltaic
PV-DesignPro	=	PV Design Program
PVSS	=	Photovoltaic System Simulation
RETScreen	=	Renewable Energy Technologies Screen software
SAM	=	Solar Advisor Model
SDHW	=	solar domestic hot water
SERIRES	=	Solar Energy Research Institute Residential Energy Simulator program
SLR	=	Solar Load Ratio
SOLCEL	=	Solar Cell Model
SPV	=	Sandia PV Array Performance model
TN	=	Thermal Network method
TRNSYS	=	Transient Systems Simulation program
Un-UT	=	Un-Utilizability method
UT	=	Utilizability method

Table 2 Applied methods in the reviewed solar analysis software.

Table 3 Annotated references of the analysis methods of the solar analysis programs.