Green Building Studio Baseline Scenario

[Andre Baros]

Is there any way to change the baseline settings used in GBS, or even to see what they are. It says "loading defaults" but there is no way to see what those are, is there?

We are considering upgrades to an existing building and would like to edit the defaults to match the existing building but we can't even see what the default assumptions are.

I hope I'm missing something

[Mike Sealander]

Andre:
As I posted to your other question on glazing and rotation, GBS is a black box for me that spits out really precise answers...to what?
I think I read somewhere that the defaults are the minimum assemblies for a T24-compliant building. The upgrades you make are upgrades to a minimally code-compliant building.
Someone else may know better.

[Andre Baros]

Regarding my original question, if I route the GBxml file through Ecotect before going to GBS I can start to define the wall properties to match the existing, but my thermal zones get messed up...or at least they are not longer defaults which GMS likes.

Mike,
I agree that GBS is a black box, but we are at the stage of a project where a black box is just right. We have a client considering a site and need to make the case now for the east west orientation rather than the north south orientation (or so we thought, the early numbers don't look worth it). We have an existing box on the site which makes a perfect baseline. I see no point in setting everything up in Ecotect when our quick model out of Revit is giving us realistic results and even if the results aren't perfect they are reasonable relative to eachother. Scheme A is 20% more efficient than scheme B, etc. which is all we would get out of Ecotect for much more work at this stage.

This is the first time we're using GBS, and we're only using it because it's now part of Ecotect... and it's taken me a dozen runs just to start to take it seriously something I never got from the demo... but closer to the hype than I ever expected.

[Mike Sealander]

Andre:
Are you saying a gbxml file out of Ecotect will get picked up in GBS with its assembly properties intact? So that if you define a wall assembly as r-19 or the equivalent U-value, GBS picks this information up for the baseline?
That would be significant.

[Andre Baros]

I have only begun to test out wall assemblies (that's this weeks project) but it definitely picks up occupancy information on a zone by zone basis (or space by space) instead of the default "by building". The GBxml file has potential.