Integration of HBIM and BEM in an Icon of Brazilian Modern Architecture

Building Energy Modeling (BEM) enhances building performance, optimizes user comfort, and identifies intervention points. In historical buildings, these studies require extensive historical data, where Historic Building Information Modeling (HBIM) becomes essential, documenting changes in construction and usage over the building’s life cycle. This research integrates HBIM and BEM to develop a simulation workflow for comfort and thermal response analysis, focusing on the Guarulhos Gymnasium, a school designed in 1960 by the architects João Batista Vilanova Artigas and Carlos Cascaldi, in Guarulhos, São Paulo, Brazil. Three models were developed to simulate different moments from the building’s timeline: "as designed" (1960), "as built" (1962), and "as is" (2022). A protocol covering all stages of analysis, from exporting the HBIM file to the thermal simulations, is presented. We also present an evaluation of using the Grasshopper–EnergyPlus API to integrate information from an HBIM model into BEM simulations. We point out limitations in this process, main gaps related to the gbXML format, and the importance of precise inputs, such as data on natural ventilation in the analyzed zones. Thus, this research contributes with (i) a replicable HBIM–BEM simulation protocol, (ii) a critical assessment of interoperability limitations between Revit, Grasshopper, and EnergyPlus, and (iii) validated thermal comfort analyses of a modernist heritage building across multiple historical scenarios.