Assign above-grade height for apartment units

[joseph-robertson]

Pull Request Description

Closes #1303.

Proposal:

• MF:
  • Top: (n_floors - 1) * ceiling_height
  • Middle: (n_floors - 1) / 2 * ceiling_height
• All other combinations of building type and level set the height to "auto"; this ensures we use OS-HPXML defaults:
  • Slab: 0 ft
  • Ambient: 2 ft
  • Heated Basement: -7 ft
  • Unheated Basement: 0 ft
  • Vented Crawlspace: 0 ft
  • Unvented Crawlspace: 0 ft

Update BuildExistingModel to register unit height above grade as build_existing_model.unit_height_above_grade.

Fuel Use: Electricity: Total

Fuel Use: Natural Gas: Total

HVAC Design Load: Heating: Total

HVAC Design Load: Cooling Latent: Total

HVAC Design Load: Cooling Sensible: Total

Checklist

Not all may apply:

• Tests (and test files) have been updated
• Documentation has been updated
  • If related to resstock-estimation, checklist includes data dictionary, source report, options saturation, options_lookup.
• Add to the changelog_dev.rst file
• openstudio tasks.rb update_measures has been run
• No unexpected regression test changes on CI (checked comparison artifacts)

[shorowit]

It might be a minor impact, but I'd suggest defaulting to a 2ft belly for mobile homes. That's what OS-HPXML does (see here).

[joseph-robertson]

Building ID = 10 (Geometry Stories = 21).
geometry_unit_height_above_grade = 0, 8, ..., 152, 160.

[joseph-robertson]

It might be a minor impact, but I'd suggest defaulting to a 2ft belly for mobile homes. That's what OS-HPXML does (see here).

Hmm maybe we were already defaulting to the 2 ft for Mobile Home w/ Ambient foundation type?

[afontani]

After talking a bit with @joseph-robertson, my initial reaction is that the heating energy (natural gas) goes up large enough that I might suggest we assign some value to the argument based on height. I am a little hesitant is that our modeling of large MF buildings is sort of limited right now.

[afontani]

@asparke2 : I wanted to let you know that we are considering using a new capability in OS-HPXML for multi-family units that are located above ground level. This would allow us to assign a height of the unit that impacts windspeed and resulting load due to infiltration. This is just to inform you of Multi-Family-related things coming down the pipeline as we plan the Multi-Family work.

[joseph-robertson]

What about the space (height) between floors? We should look at what OS-HPXML does, and whether we should consider, e.g., plenums, etc.

[afontani]

@joseph-robertson : The differences are relatively small and have diminishing returns as the height increases. Let's not include the distance between floors.

[afontani]

If the tests pass, let's merge this.