MATERIAL MATCHING PROCESS FOR ENERGY PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS

In the current construction industry where various stakeholders take part, BIM Data exchange using standard format can provide a more efficient working environment for related staffs during the life-cycle of the building. Currently, the formats used to exchange the data from 3D-CAD application to structure energy analysis at the design stages are IFC, the international standard format provided by IAI, and gbXML, developed by Autodesk. However, because of insufficient data compatibility, the BIM data produced in the 3D-CAD application cannot be directly used in the energy analysis, thus there needs to be additional data entry. The reasons for this are as follows: First, an IFC file cannot contain all the data required for energy simulation. Second, architects sometimes write material names on the drawings that are not matching to those in the standard material library used in energy analysis tools. DOE-2.2 and Energy Plus are the most popular energy analysis engines. And both engines have their own material libraries. However, our investigation revealed that the two libraries are not compatible. First, the types and unit of properties were different. Second, material names used in the library and the codes of the materials were different. Furthermore, there is no material library in Korean language. Thus, by comparing the basic library of DOE-2, the most commonly used energy analysis engine worldwide, and EnergyPlus regarding construction materials; this study will analyze the material data required for energy analysis and propose a way to effectively enter these using semantic web's ontology. This study is meaningful as it enhances the objective credibility of the analysis result when analyzing the energy, and as a conceptual study on the usage of ontology in the construction industry.