Daylight availability and manual lighting control in office buildings

This study aims to encourage a wider usage of daylighting design features in office buildings. The two major outputs are a dynamic, RADIANCE-based daylight simulation method and a manual lighting control model. The former method predicts the annual daylight availability in arbitrary buildings with complicated facade geometries and advanced shading devices such as external venetian blinds. Simulation results have been compared to conventional daylight simulation method s and to illuminance measurements in a full scale test-bed under more than 10,000 sky conditions. The manual lighting control model considers occupant behavior to predict the temporary status of manually operated artificial lighting and blind systems. The model combines simulated indoor illuminance and occupancy profiles with probabilistic switching patterns to predict the electric energy demand for artificial lighting in a work place. The switching patterns have been derived from a literature review of past field studies and a monitoring pilot study in an office building in Southern Germany.