Kim −
The answer really depends on what you and your team need from the software. I can add little to the list of tools already mentioned but will provide a few more details. Based on your need for Easy to use, inexpensive, and able to do "…energy performance analysis at the schematic design (or before) phase" narrows your choices down quite a bit (now that Ecotect is gone), and that would be either a Rhino/grasshopper workflow with either Honybee and Ladybug, or DIVA and Archsim, or Openstudio with Sketchup.
I would add BeOpt (https://beopt.nrel.gov/) to Professor Haglund's list of reliable tools that should be useful for any designer of small projects. BeOpt adds a parametric and optimization component to the design process. These tools are readily available, easy to learn and to use. However, BeOpt and HEED quickly become limited when dealing with increasingly complex designs, therefore limiting their use to residential and small scale projects.
Before eQUEST, I would direct you to OpenStudio (OS) as a valuable tool with much more capability for building performance analysis, but with a learning curve (https://www.energy.gov/eere/buildings/downloads/openstudio-0). Openstudio allows the user to take a project from conceptual massing through to detailed analysis for code compliance and Green Building credits. The software is free and geometry can be created in Sketchup. The software is able to handle complex and larger projects than HEED and BeOpt as well as providing detail and flexibility relevant to the level of analysis needed. The energy simulation engine behind OS is EnergyPlus, which will give a great deal of detail and flexibility for future energy studies if required.
eQUEST is indeed a powerful, robust, and free (http://www.doe2.com/equest/) tool as already described. However, it does have a steep learning curve and is not as flexible in exploring site or context in the early design phase.
With that stated, the two strongest tool sets for experimental, conceptual, and schematic design (even predesign) would be the Honybee and Ladybug (HB+LB) (http://www.ladybug.tools/)), and DIVA and Archsim (http://diva4rhino.com/, and http://archsim.com/) for Rhino/Grashopper both of which provide more options for early design exploration than and other standalone tools currently available. The HB+LB plugins are also available for Revit/Dynamo work flows.
There is considerable overlap between these two tool sets however, HB+LB provide more tools for climate, site, and urban microclimate analysis. As with OS, EnergyPlus is used by both HB+LB and Archsim as the simulation engine allowing for more detailed analysis in other programs or to output a usable idf file for your energy consultants. For solar and lighting simulations both HB+LB and DIVA employ Radiance as the simulation engine.
Notable drawbacks include: a copy of Rhino (or Revit) is needed in order to run these tools; the learning curve for either tool can be steep if the user is unfamiliar with the visual programing process used in Grasshopper or Dynamo; DIVA and Archsim has an added cost to purchase; the depth and detail of results can be limited to the users experience.
The benefits to these tools are that they are part of a greater network of plugins for the Rhino/Grasshopper software allowing for great flexibility in the exploration of form and context; Rhino costs less for a perpetual license than a single seat for Revit or Sefaira for a year; there is a very good chance recent architecture graduates have experience with a Rhino/Grasshopper workflow, potentially saving time and cost on the learning curve; with more experience, more detailed results can be extracted from the tools; and if the limits of the tools are reached, the E+ idf files these tools produce can be easily imported into a devoted energy simulation tool (i.e. Simergy, https://d-alchemy.com/html/products/DAProducts_Simergy.html).
My personal workflow includes DIVA/Archsim and/or HB+LB until the design is nailed down, then export the energy file (idf) to either Openstudio or, if I need fine detail and advanced optimization of building elements, to EnergyPlus where I use a combination of a text editor and (gasp!) the native EnergyPlus idf editor.
For a more comprehensive list of energy and lighting simulation tools, please refer to the BEST Directory hosted by IBPSA at https://www.buildingenergysoftwaretools.com/. There you will find all these programs and many more with links.
Hope this helps.
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James Erickson
Architecture :⇔ Design ∩ Research ∩ Environment
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Original Message:
Sent: 04-09-2018 15:40
From: Kim Shinn
Subject: Energy Modeling Software
Does anyone have a recommendation for software that is easy to use and relatively inexpensive for doing energy performance analysis at the schematic design (or before) phase? We are looking for a tool that gives good quantitative comparisons for things like massing, orientation, fenestration, and so forth.
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Kim Shinn
Principal/Sr Sustainability Consultant
TLC Engineering for Architecture
Brentwood TN
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