Free tools

Tools for Early-Stage Decisions

Lightweight tools for architects, engineers, and designers — from early design through compliance modeling. No login, no paywall — just useful answers, fast.

CBECC-Com & CBECC-Res
CBECC Model Visualizers

For anyone who's opened a CBECC compliance model and had no idea what they were looking at. Drop in a .cibd25x seed model or the AnalysisResults.xml from a compliance run and get it back as a 3D geometry view, a schematic floor plan, or an area-block summary — three viewers built to check our own models faster.

Three tools
3D Geometry Viewer
Nonresidential AnalysisResults Viewer
Multifamily AnalysisResults Viewer
You get Zone geometry, floor plans, elevations, and a compliance summary — parsed locally in your browser, nothing uploaded.
Open tools No login required
AIA 2030 Challenge · California
AIA 2030 Challenge: California pEUI Estimator

For California architects tracking the AIA 2030 Challenge. Enter three inputs and instantly see your predicted Energy Use Intensity (pEUI) and where your building lands relative to the 2030 Challenge target for your building type.

You enter
Building type
Building size
California zip code
You get Predicted pEUI for your California building type and climate, benchmarked against the AIA 2030 Challenge target — with a visual showing how far above or below target you are.
Open tool No login required
Title 24 · Nonresidential ACM
Title 24 ACM HVAC Atlas

A visual reference for the standard HVAC systems defined in California's Title 24 Nonresidential Alternative Compliance Manual — the systems your compliance software shorthands as SZ-VAV, DOAS-FPFC, PVAV-PFPB, and the rest. See what's actually inside each one: coil types, plant equipment, and how it's all plumbed together.

What's inside
Every standard ACM system, laid out schematically
Coil types and plant equipment for each system
How the pieces are plumbed together, end to end
You get A plain-English visual breakdown of each standard system — built for anyone learning to read Title 24 HVAC system definitions, not just modelers.
Open tool No login required
California Title 24 · EnergyPlus Data
CalBEM Prototype EUI Viewer

EnergyPlus batch-simulation results for California's CalBEM new-construction prototypes — end-use energy intensity by building type across all 16 CEC climate zones. Filter by prototype and zone in the browser, or just grab the CSV.

What's inside
All 16 CEC climate zones, each run with TMYx.2011-2025 weather
Every CalBEM new-construction prototype, stackable for comparison
Full end-use breakdown — heating, cooling, lighting, equipment, and more
You get Site and source EUI plus the full end-use breakdown per prototype and climate zone — filterable here, or downloadable as a CSV for your own analysis.
Open tool No login required
Not ours, but on our desktop daily

Tools we didn't build, but couldn't work without.

Free, browser-based, and built by people who clearly do this work themselves. All credit to them.

Weather data
epwvis

Built by Matt Dahlhausen

A fast, free EPW viewer — drop in any weather file and get timeseries, heatmaps, psychrometric charts, degree days, sun charts, and more. Our go-to for a quick read on a climate before a model even starts.

Open epwvis Sun angles
2D Sun-Path

Built by Dr. Andrew Marsh

Interactive sun-path diagrams in orthographic or polar projections, with a world map overlay showing the sun's actual path over the site. A fast, visual gut-check on shading and solar angles.

Open Sun-Path Weather data
Weather Data

Built by Dr. Andrew Marsh

Drag in an EPW and see any weather metric as an animated 3D surface across day-of-year and hour-of-day — a different way to spot patterns than a flat chart.

Open Weather Data
Need something more specific?

These tools answer early questions.
We answer the harder ones.

When a project needs more than a quick estimate, we do the full analysis — energy modeling, compliance strategy, MEP Basis of Design.

Talk to us about your project