1 Temporal Visualization of Building Occupancy Phase

Numerous interrelated factors affect building performance. Physical building elements, internal and external climatic conditions, and building occupants interact through time to impact the way a building consumes resources. Currently, however, leading building performance software programs represent much of the information related to these factors in text or chart form. Such representations make it difficult for building designers, operators, and other stakeholders to understand how this information interacts through time. This paper describes an early prototype called OViz, which creates spatio-temporal representations of (observed and/or assumed) geometry, occupancy, environmental, and performance data, and enables users to visualize and explore how this information changes through time in a 3D environment. We are testing the extent to which these visualizations help designers and operators understand and detect meaningful patterns and interrelationships amongst the information and whether they can support design and operations decisions