Berkeley Decarb Tool

An online tool for early-phase building HVAC decarbonization.

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Status: Current

Funding Sources: California Energy Commission EPIC Program CBE Industry Partners

Categories: HVAC Systems | Variable Air Volume Systems | UFAD Systems | Integrated Systems | Controls | Tools and Methods | Online Tools

Project Objective

Develop an open-source web tool to support building decarbonization analysis in the early design stages of a project that enables users to evaluate and compare the long-term operational carbon emissions of HVAC systems under different equipment configurations and emissions scenarios.

Significance to Industry

Current resources for HVAC decarbonization lack consistency, transparency, and may not be based on scientific foundations from HVAC decarbonization studies. They may also suffer from reliance on proprietary or ad hoc internal modeling approaches. Current methods are fragmented and inconsistent, and analyses may omit key features or make overly simplified assumptions – for instance, using constant equipment performance, or using annual grid emissions factors instead of hourly values, or omitting pre-combustion emissions or refrigerant leakage estimates.

Research Approach

The tool addresses limitations with current resources by providing a calculation methodology and default assumptions based on the latest scientific consensus. This project lowers the barrier to assessing electrification pathways for practitioners and decision makers by providing a standardized framework that incorporates equipment performance and grid emissions into a single, accessible platform.

The tool builds on an initial selection of a representative heating and cooling load profile, drawn from pre‑simulated DOE reference models, CBE’s measured building loads dataset, or a user upload. Equipment scenarios, defined as a combination of boilers, chillers, air-to-water heat pumps, heat recovery water-to-water heat pumps, and their associated operational settings, are used to convert building loads to electricity and gas site energy usage. Finally, CO2-equivalent source emissions are calculated based on emission scenarios that include information on the analysis year, grid region, and refrigerant leakage. A range of default graphics are provided to visualize how each combination of equipment and emissions scenario performs in terms of energy use and operational carbon emissions.

Presentations