Tool Name: Building Life Cycle Cost and Sustainability Calculator

Documentation:

1. Overview

The tool is called “Building Life Cycle Cost and Sustainability Calculator”. The major functionality of this tool is to calculate the life cycle cost of the given building. All current buildings around it will also be considered in the calculation. The life cycle cost covers the 3 major phases of the building project: Construction, Maintenance and Operation, and Demolishment. The time value of money will also be taken into consideration through the input interest rate, and consequently the result will be provided in a form of EUAC (equivalent uniform annual cost) for a relatively fair result considering different usage lives. Proportion of solar energy regeneration in total electricity consumption will also be in the results for sustainability reference. The tool is recommended to be run with Dynamo Generative Design.

2. Inputs, Constants, and Outputs

Inputs:

Height of the building
Design usage life
Unit price of solar panel (determines the efficiency of solar panels chosen)
Interest Rate (annual)

Constants:

Base section of the building
Top Section of the building
Story Height
Location and size of the surrounding buildings (count of the surrounding buildings can also be adjusted)
Construction unit price
Maintenance unit price
Building solar insulation - energy convert coefficient (indicates how solar insulation will reflect on HVAC system electricity cost)
Unit price of electricity
Demolishment unit price
Solar regeneration rate (the proportion of solar energy that can be regenerated to electricity)
Location, weather, and sun path

Outputs:

EUAC of life cycle cost
Proportion of energy regenerated
Present worth of construction cost (auxiliary)
Present worth of operation and maintenance cost (auxiliary)
Present worth of demolishment cost (auxiliary)

3. Using Guidance

Step 1: Choosing your constants

Input building geometry
Input geometry of surrounding buildings
Determine unit prices
Determine coefficients
Make location, weather, and sun path settings

Step 2: Run Generative Study Case

Open Dynamo Generative Design
Choose the Dynamo graph and input study name
Determine whether the inputs should be variables or constants
Determine the optimization option (minimize or maximize the outputs, typically minimizing life cycle cost and maximizing energy regeneration proportion)
Run the study

4. Typical Results

Model graphs

Can be sorted by any input or output variables.

Scatterplot

X-Axis, Y-Axis, size, and color can be set to any input or output variables.

Parallel Coordinates

In this case the interest rate is set to constant, but you can set it as a variable.

5. Demo Video

ACC Folder Link: https://acc.autodesk.com/docs/files/projects/8c5c6f0e-77ad-475c-b808-18ff440afe0a?folderUrn=urn%3Aadsk.wipprod%3Afs.folder%3Aco.7ueiG1f1QJ2M6eH-qXqoxA&viewModel=detail&moduleId=folders

Zhiyuan Cheng - Module 8 - Part 2