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How to enable Radiance in EnergyPlus simulation?

This guide will show you how to enable Radiance in EnergyPlus simulation.

Users can enable Radiance for desired accuracy in daylighting simulation. Radiance can be used to calculate workplane illuminance, eDGPs, and etc. See How to calculate workplane illuminance and eDGPs using three-phase method? for more information.

Workflow

  1. Setup an EnergyPlus Model

  2. Setup EnergyPlus Simulation

0. Import the required classes and functions

import frads as fr

1. Setup an EnergyPlus Model

You will need a working EnergyPlus model in idf or epjson format to initialize an EnergyPlus model. Or you can load an EnergyPlus reference model from pyenergyplus.dataset. See How to run a simple EnergyPlus simulation? for more information on how to setup an EnergyPlus model.

epmodel = fr.load_energyplus_model("medium_office.idf")

2. Setup EnergyPlus Simulation

Initialize EnergyPlus simulation setup by calling EnergyPlusSetup and passing in an EnergyPlus model and an optional weather file.

To enable Radiance for daylighting simulation, set enable_radiance to True; default is False. When enable_radiance is set to True, the EnergyPlusSetup class will automatically setup the three-phase method in Radiance. 

epsetup = fr.EnergyPlusSetup(
    epmodel, weather_files["usa_ca_san_francisco"], enable_radiance=True
)

After the radiance is enabled, the following calculations can be performed:

epsetup.calculate_wpi() more info

or

epsetup.rworkflows[zone_name].calculate_sensor()more info

epsetup.calculate_edgps() more info

or

epsetup.rworkflows[zone_name].calculate_edgps()more info

See How to calculate workplane illuminance and eDGPs using three-phase method? and How to simulate spatial daylight autonomy using three-phase method? for more information on how to calculate workplane illuminance and eDGPs using Radiance.