C004 -- Building Envelope Optimization for Future Climatic Demands by Simple-Box Model

This paper investigates opportunities to perform an early-stage energy simulation using a simple-box model to improve the project's resiliency for future climatic demands. This study analyzes different weather datasets to evaluate the energy-efficient envelope design decisions for a K-12 prototype school in a hot and humid climate zone (2A) due to climate change. The analysis considers twenty-three years of individual historical weather files from 1998 to 2020, six typical meteorological year weather files, and two future weather projection files. This study found that the cooling load may rise in the future while the heating load may significantly decrease. The sensitivity analysis for reducing cooling loads showed that window-to-wall ratio (WWR%) and glazing type more affect the cooling energy loads than other envelope features for the provided construction characteristics of the prototype school substantially.