Post occupancy calibration and reassessment of design phase energy modeling

Extensive energy modeling was used during the design process of the Aldo Leopold Foundation Legacy Center in Baraboo, Wisconsin (USA) both to minimize the building’s overall projected energy use and in a number of instances to determine whether proposed subsystems were viable for maintaining comfort. This paper focuses on three such simulations: a comparison of the thermal performance of earth ducts versus energy recovery ventilators as outdoor-air pre-treatment devices, the design of a heat pump / radiator system to provide minimal heating in an infrequently used wing of the building, and the use of a heat pipe between the photovoltaic array inverter room and the air handler to provide ventilation air stream reheat in the cooling season. The paper presents a critique of the three design decisions based on experiential performance in the case of the heat pipe and heat pump/radiator systems, and based on data monitoring and model calibration in the case of the earth ducts.