Autodesk Announces the Launch of Autodesk Insight, a Cloud Module Available Starting with Revit 2023.1, Enabling Carbon Emissions Analysis for Buildings [Tech Preview for Carbon Insights]. This analysis provides architects with insights into the embodied carbon impact during the initial design phase.
Context
Buildings are responsible for approximately 40% of global carbon emissions, making them the largest contributor to climate change. To reduce the total carbon impact, building designers must address both embodied carbon and operational carbon as part of an integrated design process.
This new feature in Tech Preview provides an analytical tool that allows designers to better understand the “initial” carbon impact of material and construction choices represented in their Revit building model, as an essential step toward reducing the AEC industry’s impact on climate change. To learn more about embodied carbon in the built world and how it can be reduced, check out this article.
What is Tech Preview?
Tech Previews provide early access to pre-release or beta features for evaluation, made available so that users can assess new functionalities and provide feedback. Not all analyses are available in all geographic areas and languages. Currently, Insight – Tech Preview: Carbon Insights is only available in English and for users with an active subscription to Autodesk Revit 2023.1, either as a standalone version or as part of the AEC Collection, governed by the terms of the Autodesk Tech Preview Terms and Conditions for testing purposes.
As a first step toward our vision for total carbon analysis, the module provides a new capability to help architects start early analysis of embodied carbon in building exterior walls.
This is also the first in a series of ongoing developments for the next generation of Insight, which will combine both operational carbon and embodied carbon data, progressing toward our vision of more sustainable construction projects through BIM workflows. Being a cloud service, we will make regular updates to this feature.
How to Get Started
To access the Tech Preview Insight: Carbon Insights, you must install the Carbon Insights Add-On in Revit. You can find it in the Autodesk Desktop App, as well as in your Autodesk account. Once installed, you can find the Add-On under the Analyze tab, as the new Carbon Insights panel.
Check Insight Tech Preview Help for more details on how to get started.
How It Works
Iteration in the early phase and design analysis, such as energy modeling and embodied carbon analysis, is a key process in mitigating the environmental impact of design decisions and decarbonizing the built environment. Over the last decade, Autodesk has worked to address these challenges by developing tools such as Autodesk Insight / Green Building Studio and Revit Systems Analysis. Thanks to feedback from firms and individuals engaged in the Autodesk community, we’ve learned a great deal about critical workflows, inputs/outputs, and user experience necessary to make these predictive analytical tools an integral part of every project, from the early stages through detailed design and construction.
The analysis methodology uses Revit’s Energy Analytical Model, a workflow that configures and structures Revit data for preparation for calculations and analysis. These are the same data that Insight/Systems Analysis uses for operational energy analysis and represent an important benchmark for developing early and integrated total carbon analysis. For embodied carbon insights, data on carbon illustrated by materials are taken from the Building Transparency EC3 dataset.
For more information on the benefits of Revit 2023, license cost optimization, Autodesk’s vision and approach, and especially the role of Revit and the energy analytical model, contact us here.
