The Sustainable Design Toolbox

Autodesk Building Performance Analysis Blog

Simon Gillis — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 11:24:34 +0000

With this blog being mothballed I wanted to mention that you can now find out Building Performance Analysis related information, news, and learning material at the Autodesk Building Performance Analysis blog run by Emile Kfouri and John Kennedy.

Access it here: Building Performance Blog

New Blog

Simon Gillis — Thu, 06 Sep 2012 17:24:41 +0100

I have found it difficult to maintain my personal blog for a while so my focus will now go on contributing to my teams's new BIM focused blog. With more hands on deck so to speak, and with a wider BIM focus, this will be regularly updated.

You can find us all over at:

The BIM Toolbox

The Sustainable Design Toolbox will be 'mothballed' for the forseeable future. Thanks to all of you who have stopped by to read my posts.

Autodesk at Ecobuild 2012

Simon Gillis — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 11:43:22 +0100

Last week was a very busy one at the UK's Ecobuild show. What stood out was the sheer volume of activity around Building Information Modelling with both the number of visitors to the stand wanting to know more, and the topic widely covered in the conference seminar programme.

We also had some great customer presentations on our stand from Architype, BIM Technologies and Pozzoni that were very well received. Many thanks to them for participating.

Autodesk at Ecobuild 2012 March 20th-22nd

Simon Gillis — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 16:16:12 +0000

Not long to go now until Ecobuild 2012. If you are attending please drop by stand N520 and say hello.

We will be running a series of lectures in our theatre area on the stand, presented by both Autodesk technical staff, resellers, and customers such as Space, Architype and Pozzoni.

For more details see:

Autodesk Theatre Schedule

Ecobuild 2012 Website

Look forward to seeing you there.

Rapid Energy Modelling Videos

Simon Gillis — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 16:00:17 +0000

I have put together a series of videos outlining the process of Rapid Energy Modelling, from developing an outline in 123D Catch to modelling and analysis in Autodesk Revit or Vasari. These give a taster to what is possible for analysing existing building portfolios, additional analysis can be carried out in Autodesk Green Building Studio or third party applications.

Part 1 - Creating reference points in 123D Catch

Part 2 - Tracing an outline plan in 123D Catch

Part 3 - Exporting from 123D Catch to DWG

Part 4 - Accuracy of 123D Catch

Part 5 - Importing to Revit

Part 6 - Setting site location in Revit

Part 7 - Creating the building envelope in Revit

Part 8 - Configuring energy settings in Revit

Part 9 - Configuring custom zones in Revit

Part 10 - Creating custom glazing in Revit

Part 11 - Creating custom shading in Revit

Part 12 - Analysing the model in Revit

New Autodesk Green Building Studio Release

Simon Gillis — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 21:28:21 +0000

A new release of Autodesk Green Building Studio has gone live with some great new features, some in particular aimed at existing portfolio analysis:

Utility Building History Upload. Now you can upload the utility history of existing buildings to compare to your simulation results. In the Run List you can now view and edit utility data that is currently assigned to a project.

Historical Weather Data. Over 10 years of historical data is automatically selected for your project location. Now when you upload the billing history of your existing building, the weather data is automatically synchronised to that billing period.

Run Results Charts. New Monthly and Annual results charts allow you to quickly sort and review a large number of runs in your project.

gbXML file Upload. Now you can upload gbXML files without a desktop client.

There has also been some tidying up of the interface and one nice enhancement I noticed is your currency is automatically selected for your project location, no more need for me to trawl through a long list looking for GB Pounds :-)

BIM Show Live 2011

Simon Gillis — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 14:14:53 +0000

Tomorrow is BIM Show Live Day in London, an event covering all aspects of the BIM lifecycle. I'll be there presenting Rapid Energy Modelling, using BIM for portfolio analysis. See the agenda here:

BIM Show Live Agenda

If you are there, be sure to say hello.

Conceptual Energy Analysis & CFD Overview

Simon Gillis — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 15:10:50 +0100

I recently had a requirement to create an overview whitepaper for Autodesk tools that can be used for early stage energy analysis. With help from my Simulation colleague Jonah Normand, we have outlined Revit Conceptual Energy Analysis, Project Vasari, Green Building Studio and Simulation CFD tools. I thought I would share as you may find it useful:

Download Autodesk & Sustainability - Conceptual Building Performance Analysis Overview

(Best to right click and open in a new window)

AEC Webinar Series

Simon Gillis — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 12:00:19 +0100

The Northern Europe Technical Team are running a series of webcasts on various AEC products and workflows, some have already been run and recorded, others are scheduled for live presentation over the next few months.

You can register for upcoming webinars and watch the recordings at:

AEC Webinars

Please note the times are set from the UK, so either British Summer Time or GMT.

Sustainability Tools on the Autodesk Cloud

Simon Gillis — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 17:06:17 +0100

Last week Autodesk announced Autodesk Cloud, an offering for customers featuring a range of web based capabilities. Some of the functionality is new, some has been around for some time. From the sustainable design perspective, two of the previously available energy analysis tools are included, namely Autodesk Revit Conceptual Energy Analysis and Autodesk Green Building Studio, videos of which can be found below:

Further details on the benefits of Autodesk Cloud and how to access them can be found at:

Autodesk Cloud