New Solar Envelope Component now available

Hello Ladybuggers!

We have just released a new solar Envelope component for Laybug called SolarEnvelopeAdvanced! The component offers two envelopes -

Solar rights - A 3D envelope which defines the maximum height of built volume which would not violate the solar access for defined surroundings given filtered sun vectors.

Solar Collection - A complementary 3D envelope which defines the lowest heights from which a new built volume would receive solar access, given a built context and filtered sun vectors.

The new component harnesses ladybug's SunPath tool to determine relevant sun positions based on input from an .epw file. The simulation also takes into account surrounding buildings if provided or a self envelope if omitted, with the goal of adding control and flexibility in conjunction with a more accurate simulation.

A video tutorial is available here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRtsxgJCVEw

An example file is both attached and accessible through here - https://www.dropbox.com/s/ao11882no95io9x/solarEnvelopeAdvanced_exa...

The component takes as an input a filtered list of sun vectors, a base surface which represents the site border and a list of curves, representing the surrounding context

and outputs a point cloud and a polysurface -

which in turn can be closed and further evaluated (On the left - solar collection, on the right - solar rights) -

By Boris Plotnikov and with the assistance and guidance of Prof. Guedi Capeluto, based on SustArc model. The component could not have be alive without the invaluable help of the awesome Chris Mackey and Mostapha Sadeghipour Roudsari in development and integration, also a big thanks is due to Abraham Yezioro for testing and advising on usability.

For further reading it might be worth taking a look at Ralph Knowles's work, e.g -http://www.fau.usp.br/aut5823/Acesso_ao_Sol/Knowles_2003_Solar_Enve...
and G. Capeluto and E. Shaviv's, e.g - http://www.ibpsa.org/proceedings/BS1999/BS99_C-22.pdf
the component relies to a great extend on the concepts described there.

Thanks for reading and enjoy!

Attachments:

solarEnvelopeAdvanced_example_file.gh, 414 KB

Replies are closed for this discussion.

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Olivier Dambron on November 5, 2016 at 10:13pm

Thank you for this great tool.

If I understand correctly, the method here relies on geometrical dependencies with the Sun Vectors.
Could it be applied with dependencies to simulation results such as the VSC component?

Olivier

Permalink Reply by Bi Xiaojian on January 16, 2017 at 7:13pm

Hi Boris and group members,

Thanks a lot for so great component, Boris.

I got a small problem by making a closed volume, which you can see below. I checked the envelope there was no error, but when to use the BBX to check the intersective boundary line, there was a gap.

So, could you please help me out ?

Thank you in advance.

Attachments:

2 Architecture_Solar Enevolope&Fan.gh, 494 KB

Permalink Reply by Devang Chauhan on January 16, 2017 at 10:52pm

Hi Xiaojian,

Please find attached file.

-Devang

Attachments:

2Architecture_SolarEnevolopeFan.gh, 488 KB

Permalink Reply by Bi Xiaojian on January 17, 2017 at 5:15am

Hi Devang,

That did a great help. Thanks a lot.

Best regards

Xiaojian

Permalink Reply by Julia T on January 17, 2017 at 9:16am

Hi Boris,

First of all, great tool!!! very interesting.

I would like to ask something. I didn't have the opportunity to test the tool yet, so sorry if it's stupid.

Is there any way to create the mesh for the solar rights under the condition of the surroundings getting just 1h of sunlight?

I am thinking on a very restricted area, so how to get the minimum sun rights without reducing too much the available volume for your development.

I get that it can be tested just for 12:00 as the most vertical sun position, but sometimes the urban morphology is quite tricky and another hour may be better for the solar access.

Julia

Permalink Reply by Boris Plotnikov on January 17, 2017 at 11:25pm

Hi Julia,

First of all, not a stupid question at all.

We're thinking of implementing something similar but for now there isn't an automated way to do that. You could set something up with a bit of grasshopper though, especially as you're just interested in one sun hour and each iteration shouldn't take that long (though that also depends on the context and the test surface).

Boris

Permalink Reply by Julia T on January 18, 2017 at 4:50am

Thanks Boris,

I guess it may be worthy to check the best timing for each volume with the ray-tracing tool and then running your tool during those hours... I think its something worthy to test.

So interesting!