Is measuring LUX in a model possible?

baz

Yes, LightUp will give you amount of energy falling on the surface as well as a pseudo color image which can help quickly identify problem areas. You can get exact readings using the lightmeter inside LightUp.

It won't give you how much energy you need to make plants healthy.

So with a model like that, based in Boulder, CO on 1st December, the wall gets just 0.11 Kwh/meter/day:

whereas on 24th July, it gets 1.27 Kwh/meter/day:

Thanks Adam, it's looking interesting, when I mentioned 'light energy' I meant the actual lights which might need to be installed to supplement the existing natural light.
The usual method, as I understand it, of presenting lux info is to spreadsheet it, ie: four columns dividing the year into quarters, each column showing lux for 2/3 times of day. It would be great to be able to present this graphically as you have shown, but you would still need the numbers. Would this be a lot of work in Lightup?
baz

baz

@remus said:

With regards to having to learn a new app, if youve already got a bit of experience in rendering you shouldnt have any problems with lightup.

Total experience is a couple of months with Twilight after several failed attempts to come to grips with some of the others. (Kerkythea baffled me and I didnt get much past screenshots with the other ones

But the way this thread is going I might have to bite the bullet with lightup.
baz

baz

@solo said:

Baz, sorry for being off topic, I just wanted to show you a restaurant chain here in Texas that uses their roof as a garden, a company I previously worked with had a maintenance contract with a few of them.

Hi Solo, that looks good.
Fytogreen do roof gardens as well as the vertical variety.
The thing with the Fytogreen system is the use of a water and nutrient retaining sterile foam which weighs very little which means roof structures etc dont have to be engineered for huge loads. Off the top of my head, a sq metre of fully saturated media with plants weighs 40kilos, a significant weight saving over soil.
baz

If you are interested here are the links:
http://www.fytogreen.com.au/Fytowall
http://www.fytogreen.com.au/roof_garden_systems

Didier Bur

Hi,
You can also try Dialux (freeware)
http://www.dial.de
Export your SU models to 3DS and here you go.
Regards,

baz

@didier bur said:

Hi,
You can also try Dialux (freeware)
http://www.dial.de
Export your SU models to 3DS and here you go.
Regards,

Thanks for the link Didier, I will have a look.
baz

charly2008

Hi,

I have a question about IES Lights. On the Internet there are many catalogs with IES Lights. Is there a possibility to use it in Sketchup and Kerkythea? I've only used the KT-Lights in the plugin folder.

Karlheinz

thomthom

Moved the thread to the Developer's forum. We have reorganized so that the Plugin section is only a list of plugins you can download and use.

minguinhirigue

I am quite impressed seeing how lightup have improve since the first time I use it...

I guess I should try it again, but metropolis render give me very good results in Kerkythea and podium.

Adam, is it possible to extract some insulation numerical values (eg : on a desk) after the calculation ? I would like to use it in a lighting optimization script.

AdamB

@minguinhirigue said:

Adam, is it possible to extract some insulation numerical values (eg : on a desk) after the calculation ? I would like to use it in a lighting optimization script.

Yes, in that you can call the LightUp functions from Ruby to generate "spot" results at locations you choose. ( view.spotlux(x,y)) but really we should have a proper report generating framework.

What kind of information / format are you looking for?

Adam

wind-borne

Just downloaded LightUp , question about Lux.

Does the default extinction(0.5) give proper insolation values for daily sunlight output?

AdamB

Short answer: Yes, within the limits of the insolation model used. Essentially the interaction in the atmosphere are so complex that researchers have produced numerous models that try and capture essence of the issue without going nuts. Its a surprisingly tricky subject.

Long answer: LightUp insolation calculations use the Kasten & Young variable airmass model based on a nominal 1366 Joule/sec. In reality the amount of absorption due to the atmosphere varies with the cloud cover / haze which is represented in by a "coefficient of extinction". 0.1 would be a super clear non-hazy day. 0.8 would be overcast day. 0.5 represents some middle ground representing absorption and reflection in the atmosphere as the sunlight passes through to the ground.

LightUp takes account of geo-location in determining daily insolation and the Kasten & Young model does a good job at modelling the curvature of the Earth and thus sunlight passing through a larger "slice" of atmosphere. And of course LightUp itself occludes the sunlight using your model over a 24 hour period. Together these give a good estimation of available energy on a surface - significantly better than the very broad rules of thumb you'll find in many solar energy modelling packages.

So the Extinction coefficient is something that needs tweaking to reflect the general expected weather for your location, but it is more a fine adjustment. The general picture you'll get with leaving it 0.5 should be fine.

Adam

wind-borne

Thanks for explanation, I had tried 0 and 1 and realized I didn't understand.
Out here in the middle of the ocean in the tropics 0.35 aligned with insolation charts (5.6KWh/m sq./day) for Feb., facing South/latitude tilt.
real world translation for power produced by the panel under cursor on Thurs.
Island has many microclimates and we have well over a thousand microinverters installed at about 50 locations islandwide, most of which I made quick preview models of. So I do have data to tweak.

Thanks, again

Enlighten Microinverter.png

AdamB

Cool.

At the risk of stating the obvious, the energy falling on a surface (available energy) will be much larger than what you can actually produce - as is born out by the measurements you show.

driven

@wind-borne said:

Thurs. Island

There's a coincident, my brother in-law is a Torres Straight Islander.

but I live in England and was looking into how I might calculate solar power generation potential for a friends new house..

any tips for a complete 'solar' novice.

as you know I'm on a Mac, and will be trying out LightUp 1.8 imminently, so that may be a good time to investigate this as well.

john

wind-borne

@wind-borne said:

Thurs. Island

Actually those words are in different sentences
Thursday referring to the day.
I live on Maui,HI.

I just downloaded Fri.
Initially, I will be looking at Lux for estimates of losses due to shading as program does face calculation if I understand the static reading. Guessing the height and width of palm trees to place in model mixed with solarpathfinder readings will be pretty hypothetical and intensely visual yet possibly useful.

PM would be better concerning your question.

AdamB

@wind-borne said:

Initially, I will be looking at Lux for estimates of losses due to shading as program does face calculation if I understand the static reading.

LightUp Insolation rendering gives 3 readings:

A spot Kwh/m^2/day for the exact position from which you're taking the reading.
(Static) A Face reading of Kwh/day (ie scaled by the area of the face). This is useful if you model panels with a single face.
(Tracked) A Face reading of Kwh/day assuming the face tracks the sun (and is therefore more efficient).

Adam