BECALIB is a tool designed to run thermal analysis of building envelope components such as walls, roofs, and floors.
With this tool, you can define the materials and air gaps in a multi-layer component, run thermal analysis, and generate diagrams.
Currently, BECALIB focuses on analyzing summer performance. Specifically, it can compute time-shift and decrement factors. These values allow designers to evaluate and quantify a component's ability to break heat flow and reduce cooling loads.
Static values like u-value and thermal resistance are also available.
BECALIB provides threshold values and performance scores to help designers enhance their components.
The calculations in BECALIB have been developed in accordance with ISO standards, including ISO 13786 and ISO 6946.
Love and:
BECALIB python package is available on PyPI repository.
If you have some experience with python programming and you want a Stand-alone installation, all you need is install python on your machine.
If you are not familiar with python installations you can use/copy BECALIB notebook from google Colab Notebook DEMO.
Dependencies of BECALIB are available in requirements.txt file but you do not need to install anything because everything have been wrapped in BECALIB package available on PyPI
Google colab notebooks are available. If you want to try BECALIB and create your own components you can start here and duplicate the file.
- Activate your virtual environnement
- Install becalib with pip:
pip install becalib
!pip install becalib
You can use BECALIB in a python file or a notebook (jupyter/google colab)
from becalib import MaterialLayer, AirLayer
from becalib import ComponentInstantiate a layer objet for each component layer
Example of concrete layer setup:
concrete = MaterialLayer(
name="Concrete",
thickness=0.1, # m
thermal_conductivity=1.8, # lambda W/mK
specific_heat_capacity=1000, # c J/kgK
gross_density=2400, # ro kg/mcExample of air gap layer setup:
air_gap = AirLayer(
name="air_gap",
thickness=0.1, # m
heat_flow_direction="Do"
)Instantiate a component objet and set:
- List of layers (interior to exterior)
- Heat flow direction:
"Ho": Horizontal (example: wall) or
"Up": Upwards (example Roof) or
"Do": Downwards (example floor) - language (en, fr, etc..)
wall = Component(name="Wall",
layers=[
concrete,
air_gap,
concrete ],
heat_flow_direction="Do",
language="en"
)wall.get_layers_dataframe(data_type="st")
print(wall.get_summer_performance_key_values())#######################################
Component: wall
Time period: 24 [h]
Thickness: 0.440 [m]
Resistance: 2.114 [m²K/W] Rsi and Rse included
Transmittance: 0.473 [W/m²K]
Decrement factor: 0.055 [-]
Time shift: 13.0 [h]
Interior areal heat capacity: 67.185 [kJ/m²K]
Summer performance: Excellent 5/5 (in accordance with italian DM 26/06/2009)
Surface mass: 612.8 [kg/m²]
#######################################
wall.get_component_layers_chart().show()
paroi.get_component_sinusoidal_wave_chart().show()
- Material and air layers classes
- Components classes
- Air resistances computations (ISO 6946:2007)
- Summer Analysis values (ISO 13786)
- Summer Analysis charts (ISO 13786)
-
Add docs with Sphinx
- set Sphinx docs
- deploy docs static pages
-
Add materials database
- Define standard materials database
- Component setup from material database
-
Add Condensation risk analysis
- Computations
- Glaser diagram
-
Add Comparator tools
- Materials comparator table
- Materials comparator charts
- Components comparator table
- Components comparator charts
-
Multi-language (gettext)
- French
- Italian
- Spanish
See the open issues for a full list of proposed features (and known issues).
Contributions are what make the open source community such an amazing place to learn, inspire, and create. Any contributions you make are greatly appreciated.
If you have a suggestion that would make this better, please fork the repo and create a pull request. You can also simply open an issue with the tag "enhancement". Don't forget to give the project a star! Thanks again!
- Fork the Project
- Create your Feature Branch (
git checkout -b feature/AmazingFeature) - Commit your Changes (
git commit -m 'Add some AmazingFeature') - Push to the Branch (
git push origin feature/AmazingFeature) - Open a Pull Request
Distributed under the MIT License. See LICENSE for more information.
Simone ARAGNO - aragno.simone@gmail.com
Project Link: https://github.com/SimoneAragno/becalib
