Hi folks,

I originally posted this on the Society of Building Science Educators list serve, and thought I'd solicit the Bldg-Sim community perspective as well. Thanks in advance for any advice.

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I'm prepping a few courses for CU this year and I'm keen to re-examine the options for whole-building analysis software for young architecture students. I realize this general topic has been the subject of many prior threads (and I'm grateful for the?EERE?Building Energy Software Tools Directory),?but each academic application has unique quirks and objectives, and I thought I'd post this query to see if anyone has undergone an?analogous?evaluation and selection process. Our department is in a bit of flux right now, but thankfully headed in a more 'integrative design' direction, so its a good opportunity for us to push building science principles and design performance assessment. Getting the right tool(s) in our labs will be an important step in the process. With apologies for the lengthy text, here's some context and requirements to address:

Academic context:
* Students are undergrads?in an architectural / environmental design?curriculum??
* Applicable courses will include both electives and studios
* Courses will focus generally on climate-sensitive building design
* Courses will stress holistic systems thinking and appropriate corollary analysis to inform design
* Due to some poor degree planning, in the near term many of the students will have no formal building systems training (I know, it's tragic....)

Software objectives:
While we all use multiple tools professionally, and I know the likely scenario is to procure a suite of programs to cover the bases for varying courses, the focus of this email is on identifying (if there is one) the best whole-building multi-purpose analysis tool to serve as our fundamental software of choice for the next few years. The core needs are:
* A tool that can be taught to beginners

* A tool that allows for simple but competent exploration of passive strategies?

* A tool that students can use to investigate the interplay of climate, envelope, loads, and systems

* A tool robust enough to stay relevant through subsequent courses with advancing rigor?(a tool they can grow with)

* Compatibility with popular CAD/3D tools (Sketchup, Revit, Rhino

Analysis requirements / desired features?(we can dream, right?):

* Climate data viewing (we can supplement w/ 'Climate Consultant' for details, but some visualization would be good)
* Capable of free-mode analysis with cogent load assessment outputs
* Competent solar / mass-storage analysis (this requirement has killed our interest in Ecotect in previous years)
* Real-time visualization of solar geometry / shading
* Radiant load visualization capabilities (something we like about Ecotect :)
* Competent daylighting analysis algorithms & daylight autonomy (don't need ray-tracing, but are there any whole building sim-tools with radiosity and visualization?)
* Standard suite of default HVAC systems with clear interface / toggle options
* Reasonably detailed HVAC system options for further study
* Radiant conditioning options
* GSHP modeling
* Natural ventilation (presume we'd need a separate CFD package if desired)
* Double skinned facades
* Multi-zone analysis and zone-isolation capabilities

* Clear parametric analysis capabilities (w variants), and good management / graphic outputs
* Renewable energy systems analysis (at least reasonably robust)
* Net zero / grid wheeling parameters
* Carbon / emissions assessment -- access to regional utility grid source profiles
* Life cycle cost analysis
* probably prefer an E+ engine

Example packages under consideration:
* Bentley AECOsim
* BEOpt (concerned about zone limitations)
* Design Advisor?
* Design Builder
* IES-VE
* LESOSAI (?)
* Open Studio
* TAS
* Vasari?
* Others? ....what are we missing?
We're aware of some of the general assets and limitations of the tools above (and their kin), and obviously no tool can do it all, so perhaps we're asking too much. I'm still expecting that a suite of tools is?ultimately?where we're headed. But we'd be keen to hear the experience of others in making similar purchase / utilization assessments for academic applications.....perhaps people have experimented and feel there's a clear choice for our situation? Or maybe people have thoughts on which tools to aggregate most effectively? ....It's such a difficult balance between rigor and?accessibility-for-beginners, and so often what works well for professionals in the field is not the best choice for the classroom. But we also don't want to teach students tools that become largely obsolete by the time they graduate....?

Grateful for your thoughts....

Kind regards,

Adam