While most IEA Solar Heating and Cooling tasks focus on technology development, Task 12 focuses on analysis and design methods to ensure the optimal design and integration of solar heating, cooling, and daylighting technology in residential and commercial buildings. Simulation tools for high performance glazings, daylighting design, and atria have been the subject of collaborative research. The Task is concerned with both detailed analysis tools and simplified design tools, although greater research emphasis is placed on the detailed analysis tools.

Two Task 12 projects deal with improving the capability of analysis and design tools through the development of appropriate algorithms for modeling solar energy-related materials, components and systems and their interaction with the buildings.

The first project concerns the development of a suite of integrated daylighting and electric lighting analysis software named ADELINE. The second concerns the development of algorithms to explicitly model the heat transfer phenomena in atria, such as stratification, radiation exchange, and natural ventilation. In addition, a recently-completed project dealt with modeling of advanced glazings and transparent insulation materials.

In another major activity, IEA researchers are evaluating the accuracy and capability of analysis and design tool algorithms in modeling the dynamic performance of the solar elements. Three types of model evaluation approached are being employed: analytical verification, comparative analysis and empirical validation.