The new simuwatt energy assessment application and platform is designed to make building energy modeling quick and easy. Building professionals can create an energy model directly from field data collected using simuwatt on the web, Windows Surface, and Apple iPad tablets.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced it is investing $19 million in 18 projects to improve the energy efficiency of U.S. homes, offices, schools, hospitals, restaurants, and stores.

An ASHRAE draft standard that describes a methodology to apply building energy modeling to the design process is open for industry input. ASHRAE Standard 209P defines minimum requirements for providing energy design assistance using building energy simulation and analysis.

ASHRAE and IBPSA-USA have announced a co-organized conference that encompasses the ASHRAE Energy Modeling Conference and IBPSA-USA SimBuild Conference. The conference, titled ASHRAE and IBPSA-USA SimBuild 2016: Building Performance Modeling, will take place Aug. 10-12, 2016, in Salt Lake City.

A set of automated calibration techniques for tuning residential and commercial building energy efficiency software models to match measured data is now available as open source code. The Autotune code, developed at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), is available on GitHub.

A new specification tool enabling designers to make accurate climate control system efficiency calculations for Daikin variable refrigerant volume (VRV) systems has been launched by Integrated Environmental Solutions (IES) in conjunction with Daikin North America.

ASHRAE announced its next Energy Modeling Conference: “Tools for Designing High Performance Buildings” will take place Sept. 30-Oct. 2, in Atlanta.