Buildings are one of the largest sources of carbon emissions in our society, and the construction sector is a key focus on all strategies aimed at achieving Net-Zero targets, nationally and internationally. Ample methodologies and technological solutions have been devised in order to allow such transition toward Net-Zero buildings, including computer aided Building Energy Simulation (BEM); however, a gap clearly exists within industry where such technologies are rarely adopted and often limited to the most ambitious projects only, due to the resources required to implement them, that do not align with the capacity of developers and designers for smaller construction projects.

FREDS is an online platform that provides a fast and simple way to perform building energy performance simulations, to assist with the selection of appropriate building components and systems during the early design stages. Furthermore it will allow industry professionals and the general public to calculate CO2e emissions of their buildings and test the impact of energy efficiency measures both on existing and new buildings, to support the improvement of energy efficiency in buildings and the achievement of Net- Zero targets.

The FREDS platform has already been partially developed to a prototype stage (estimated TRL 5) by the lead applicant (FREDS4BUILDING) in collaboration with the University of Brighton, and an online version of the current prototype can be found at [https://www.freds4buildings.com/][0].

The proposed project aims at further developing the existing prototype into a fully featured platform (expected TRL 7) including capabilities as HVAC simulation and CO2e calculations, to provide all necessary tools to industry professionals to effectively design more energy efficient buildings.

FREDS will not only give the industry the required tools to quantify the environmental impact of buildings, and compare different design solution in order to identify the best design to reduce GHG emissions, but will do so by providing industry professionals with an easy to use online service that bypasses the existing barriers toward integration of building energy simulation into the design process, namely the need for expensive licences, in-depth expertise and significant time commitment that are unacceptable by industry standards. This will ultimately result in a healthier and less polluted environment for the generations to come.

[0]: https://www.freds4buildings.com/