Large diffs between 24.1.0 and 24.2.0

[jmarrec]

Issue overview

This may be totally fine and justified, but I'm finding large diffs between 24.1.0 and 24.2.0 for some files, up to 40% Total Site EUI difference.

I'm attaching the 24.1.0 and transitioned 24.2.0 files:

large_eplus_diffs.zip

Details

Some additional details for this issue (if relevant):

• Platform (Operating system, version): Ubuntu 24.04
• Version of EnergyPlus (if using an intermediate build, include SHA): 24.2.0

Checklist

Add to this list or remove from it as applicable. This is a simple templated set of guidelines.

• Defect file added
• Ticket added to EnergyPlus Defect Complexity (Github Project)
• Pull request created (the pull request will have additional tasks related to reviewing changes that fix this defect)

[Myoldmopar]

I think the magnitude of those big diffs are reasonable given how many things we fixed in the central heat pump and VRF systems in this release.

[jmarrec]

[mjwitte]

@jmarrec The VRF Fan power (and related heating/cooling) changes are from these two PRs:
#10667
#10650
The VRF watercooled heat rejection, not sure, there are about 10 VRF-related PRs in 24.2

[yujiex]

@jmarrec the reduction in cooling might be from this #10557
The fact that heating didn't reduce as cooling might be because a similar fix of the issue where heating coil capacity not limited by OU was merged in 23.2 (#10154)

If you have the idfs for the vrf ones, I can look at what changes are the major contributors to the diffs.