Thermal simulation using BIM a case study: Tunisian traditional dwelling

Abstract

Traditional architecture is adapted to the cultural and climatic environment. It was able to respond to the conditions of minimal comfort of its inhabitants. This architecture contains centuries of knowledge to encourage researchers to make out its secret and evaluate its energy efficiency. In Tunisian context, pioneering work analysis concerning traditional houses, have shown that comfort conditions were acceptable during the hot season and mediocre during the cold season. Other studies have shown that this kind of architecture was able to respond to winter and summer climate requirements, but especially in the summer period, in coherence with the lifestyle of residents. Several study models concerning the thermal behavior of buildings are found in the literature. These models use software for simulating stationary regime or transient. Each program has its own interface and its own modeling engine, calculation and analysis, as TRNSYS (Transient System Simulation Tool) and EnergyPlus. For the simulation, we opted for sustainable software that allows architects and engineers to collaborate and interoperate more efficiently based on workflow and project requirements. The use solution is the BIM (Building Information Modeling) of Autodesk Revit that allows coordination throughout the design project. Our paper examines the effectiveness of promising new technology BIM in the thermal simulation of traditional Tunisian architecture bioclimatic. Research has showed the importance of BIM technology in the workflow and is efficiency to determine the energy performance of buildings with passive design and to evaluate their energy consumption. Revit gives interesting results for the standard contemporary home. As far as it knows, there are no studies on the traditional bioclimatic house or vernacular character using BIM technology for simulate this type of habitat. In this paper, we propose to use Revit to study the thermal behavior of the Tunisian traditional home.