Proceedings of the 10 th International Conference on Manufacturing Research ICMR 2012 MODELLING ENERGY IN BUILDINGS AND PRODUCTION SYSTEMS: THE IMPACT OF MODEL GRANULARITY AND QUALITY ON OUTPUT Chris Turner Aanand Davé Manufacturing & Materials Department Manufacturing & Materials Department Cranfield University, MK43 0AL, UK Cranfield University, MK43 0AL, UK c.j.turner@cranfield.ac.uk a.dave@cranfield.ac.uk Michael Oates Vincent Murray Institute of Energy and Sustainable Development Integrated Environmental Solutions Limited De Montfort University, LE1 9BH, UK Glasgow, G20 0SP, UK moates@dmu.ac.uk vincent.murray@iesve.com Peter Ball Manufacturing & Materials Department Cranfield University, MK43 0AL, UK p.d.ball@cranfield.ac.uk ABSTRACT The design, improvement and operation of production and facilities are conducted in isolation. Engineers in each discipline typically work independently with their own objectives, approaches and software sup- port systems. There are few available tools to link these areas together, hence, there is little or no under- standing of how such combined factory analysis should be conducted to assess and reduce factory re- source consumption. This paper reports on experimentation of an integrated production system and building model. The case data was drawn from a UK production system and experiments were conducted on the impact of model data input on model output. The results show the relationship between reducing data quality and detail on the ability to discern the system performance from the results generated. 1 INTRODUCTION The move towards more sustainable manufacturing is driving the reduction of resource use and the impact on the environment (Seliger et al, 2007). Early interventions and practice adoption seek to prevent and reduce resource use such as primary materials, energy, water, consumables, etc in localised areas such as production. As progress is made in resource reduction further advances become more challenging and scope may have to increase. Additionally, further advances may necessitate the use of modelling tech- niques to support analysis to understand the behaviour and the impact of potential solutions. The same can be said for resource reduction activity when taking a buildings and facilities perspective. In practice the design, improvement and operation of the production system and that of the building are conducted in isolation (Ball et al, 2009). Work on sustainability through the reduction in resource use, e.g. energy, is typically independent. In part this is because advances can be made currently in isolation, in part because methodologies and software do not exist to support collaboration. Decisions made in iso- lation could be sub-optimal and inappropriate, e.g. facilities may replace inefficient equipment but if pro- duction is reducing its consumption then replacements need to be sized accordingly. Modelling of product flow in production systems is well established in software (e.g. Witness, Are- na, Simul8) and its use in industry. Similarly, modelling of energy in buildings is well established in software (e.g. IES <VE>) and in practice. There are no commercially available tools to link these areas