On the Use of building energy simulation programs in the performance assessment of agricultural greenhouses

The paper explores possibility of using BES in performance evaluation of commercial agricultural greenhouses, focusing on the necessary adaptations and additional models required to obtain reliable results. The paper provides a high-level evaluation of relevant physical phenomena for energy performance of greenhouses. A comparison is made regarding the importance of each phenomenon in normal buildings and in greenhouses. The paper also need for models to predict the crop production and the necessary validation of BES models for the prediction of performance in greenhouses. Preliminary validation by inter-model comparison shows promising results and indicates that BES can be used for the energy performance evaluation of greenhouses.