Simultaneous satisfaction of both thermal and visual comfort in buildings may be a challenging task.Therefore, this paper suggests a comprehensive framework for the building energy optimization process integrating computational fluid dynamics (CFD) daylight simulations.A building energy simulation tool, IDA Indoor Climate and Energy (IDA-ICE), was coupled with three open-source tools including GenOpt, OpenFOAM, and coq-clear 100 ubiquinol Radiance.
In the optimization phase, several design variables i.e., building envelope properties, fenestration parameters, and Heating, Ventilation and Air-Conditioning (HVAC) system set points, were selected to minimize the total building energy use and simultaneously improve thermal and visual comfort.
Two different scenarios were investigated for retrofitting of a generic office building cga 200 to cga 510 adapter located in Oslo, Norway.In the first scenario a constant air volume (CAV) ventilation system with a local radiator in each zone was used, while an all-air system equipped with a demand control ventilation (DCV) was applied in the second scenario.Findings showed that, compared to the reference design, significant reduction of total building energy use, around 77% and 79% in the first and second scenarios, was achieved respectively, and thermal and visual comfort conditions were also improved considerably.
However, the overall thermal and visual comfort satisfactions were higher when all-air system was applied.