Formit 2022.1 – Energy Analysis in FormIt

By Garry Stockton

Did you know you could perform Energy Analysis in FormIt? You’ve been able to analyse your building model for energy efficiency early in the design process, in the last 2 releases, but the latest release is the best by far. 

So, what’s new with FormIt + Insight? FormIt 2022 now checks your model for common model issues before launching Insight runs and fixes common Insight failures for a more reliable experience.

How It Works

• Insight Energy Analysis uploads your FormIt model data and runs several hundred analyses in the cloud to determine various energy scores
• Energy Analysis uses Revit to analyse your model, so just like when sending FormIt data to Revit, you'll need to ensure your FormIt model is watertight and manifold.

Preparing Your FormIt Model

• Insight will use any visible geometry in your FormIt sketch.
• Ensure the building shell you want to analyse is the only visible geometry.
• Put supporting geometry like entourage, furniture and site elements on a separate Layer, and turn the Layer off.
• Insight works best with a simple, solid building model.
• Ensure your building mass is solid and watertight.
• If your building design already has openings for windows and doors, it's best to create a new mass with no openings specifically for Energy Analysis and hide the more detailed version using Layers.
• The simple building mass needs to have Levels applied.
• The FormIt model needs to have a Location set (Postcode, City name etc).

Starting Energy Analysis

• Look for the Energy Analysis button in the ribbon toolbar, click "Generate Insight" to start the process. This will upload the visible model data and will run several hundred simulations in the cloud.
  
• When complete, a message will appear at the top of the screen and the menu will update to indicate a new Insight is ready to view. Click "View Insight" to view the analysis in your web browser.