A Review Of Canadian Typical Year Weather Files For Residential Energy Simulation

The present study identifies changes in energy simulation of residential buildings in Toronto when three distinct weather simulation methodologies are used. The first is the Typical Year Canadian Weather File for Energy Calculations, the second is the actual meteorological data from the years of 1998 to 2018, and the last is an updated Canadian Weather File for Energy Calculations. The modelled buildings include a single-family home, high rise multi-unit residential building, and low rise multi-unit residential building. Missing meteorological data from the years 2015 to 2018 were collected from Environment Canada Historical Database and National Solar Radiation Database from the National Research Council Laboratory. The results show between a

range of 12% monthly variance in energy consumption for low rise buildings, a range of 15% monthly variance in high rise buildings, and a range of 11% variance in single family homes. Annual variances range 2% in total energy variances. The single-family home is verified to an actual home. These results suggest that the monthly values when in a typical year simulation are not indicative of long term actual climate. In addition, this research analyzes the differences in selected months of the Canadian Weather File for Energy Calculations when the historical dataset used to generate the file is changed. Based on the gradual increase in CDD and decrease in HDD, simulations using an updated CWEC represent a climate condition with less heating demand and more cooling demand.