Dynamic indoor temperature schedule for annual simulations

[Matteo Merli]

Hi everyone,

If I’m not mistaken, CONTAM currently does not allow setting a fully dynamic indoor temperature profile over an entire year, but only a weekly schedule that repeats itself.

Am I wrong and this is actually possible? Or is this something that could be implemented in a future release?

In my case, this feature would be very useful for dynamic simulations with variable indoor temperatures, since assigning a constant value for the whole year is not very realistic. Even splitting the analysis into separate winter and summer simulations still neglects the transitional mid-season periods, where conditions fall somewhere in between.

Thank you!

[William Dols]

One could use either a CVF or DVF file with a control on the zone.

These files support schedules up to a year long.

You could also do something like that shown in the attached PRJ, which controls zone temperature based on the outdoor temperature and desired setpoints.

You could also couple CONTAM with EnergyPlus or TRNSYS so that either performs the heat transfer calculations to determine the zone temperatures.

- Stuart

[Matteo Merli]

Thanks Stuart! I’ve now found it in the CONTAM documentation as well.

I’ll try first to create a CVF or DVF file and then import it as a control. Any idea where to find a tutorial or sample files about it?

My idea was indeed to assign values extracted from EnergyPlus, but since my CONTAM model is intended to be simpler, I hadn’t originally planned to couple them. However, I’ll also take a look into this feature at some point.

[Dols, William Stuart (Fed)]

Take a look at this conversation.

https://groups.google.com/a/list.nist.gov/g/contam/c/fzOsyb8t71o/m/-RXbX9BeAgAJ

There is an example that implements both a CVF and a DVF file.

For zone temperatures, the values in the CVF/DVF must be in units of Kelvin.

 

File formats are documented in the Working with Controls section of the User Guide.

 

- Stuart

 

From: Matteo Merli <mat...@atmoslab.io>
Sent: Monday, March 2, 2026 12:22 PM
To: CONTAM <con...@list.nist.gov>
Cc: Dols, William Stuart (Fed) <willia...@nist.gov>; mat...@atmoslab.io <mat...@atmoslab.io>
Subject: [EXTERNAL] Re: Dynamic indoor temperature schedule for annual simulations

 

You don't often get email from mat...@atmoslab.io. Learn why this is important

[Matteo Merli]

Thank you, Stuart.

Best,

Matteo