Lightpipe applications for daylighting systems

One of the main research activities of the Institute of Lighting at Technical University of Berlin concerns efficient daylight utilisation in buildings. In recent years, several national and international projects have been and are still carried out. One of them, the European research project ARTHELIO, has examined the possibility of guiding daylight into deeper building interiors using hollow light guides. The aim is to provide daylighting in deeper building interiors. Within this project, a goniophotometer was developed and built, to measure the luminous intensity distribution of lightpipes. In two demonstration sites, the daylight utilisation by the hollow light guides combined with heliostats has successfully been demonstrated. Daylight is collected by heliostats and enters the building. It is guided along hollow light guides and coupled out along its way to illuminate the building interior. Measurements show that the prototypes help to decrease the energy consumption for electric lighting of the building.     

Measurements of solar radiation and illuminance on vertical surfaces and daylighting implications

There is a growing concern about the rapid development of infrastructure and building projects and their likely impacts on the environment. Particular concerns have been raised about office building developments and energy consumption issues. In recent years, there has been increasing interest in using daylight to save energy in buildings. Lighting control integrated with daylighting is recognised as an important and useful strategy in terms of energy-efficient building design. It is believed that proper daylighting schemes can help reduce the electrical demand and contribute to achieving environmentally sustainable building developments. This paper presents a simple method for estimating the likely energy savings in electric lighting due to daylighting and the possible cooling penalty. Vertical solar radiation and illuminance data measurements are described. Cumulative frequency distributions of daylight availability are reported. The likely energy savings in office buildings are determined based on on–off and top-up controls, and the energy and environmental implications are discussed.     

Optical characterisation of materials and systems for daylighting

The measurement of BRTF (Bi-directional reflectance and transmittance function) is described using a new instrument which is capable of supplying BRTF data and algorithms for use in computer simulations directly on diffuse materials and indirectly on large samples and sub-systems. A high sensitivity and dynamic range is needed to achieve low minimum observable BRTF and the role of angular resolution are discussed with examples. Forward scattering with extended tails is found to dominate pigmented polycarbonate. Slatted blinds are discussed as examples of systems where azimuth is important.     

The performance of innovative daylighting systems

Innovative daylighting systems have four key aims; to increase daylight levels deep within rooms, to improve daylight uniformity, to control direct sunlight and to reduce glare. Results from experimental studies at the Building Research Establishment (BRE) indicated that the systems tested (prismatic glazing, prismatic film, mirrored louvres and light shelves) usually reduced illuminances at the rear of rooms compared with unshaded windows. It is concluded that, in the UK at least, innovative daylighting systems should be designed primarily as shading devices, controlling glare while admitting more daylight than conventional blinds.     

Daylight illuminance control with fuzzy logic

The purpose is to take full advantage of daylight for inside illumination. The inside illuminance and luminous efficacy of the available solar radiation were analyzed. The paper deals with the controlled dynamic illuminance response of built environment in real-time conditions. The aim is controlled functioning of the roller blind as a regulation device to assure the desired inside illuminance with smooth roller blind moving. Automatic illuminance control based on fuzzy logic is realized on a test chamber with an opening on the south side. The development and design of the fuzzy controller for the corresponding positioning of the roller blind with the available solar radiation as external disturbance is the subject of this paper.     

A glazing unit for solar control, daylighting and energy conservation

The glazing unit for solar control, daylighting and energy conservation is a system consisting of two prismatic panes. The prismatic ribs of the panes are inclined by a certain angle to the horizontal within the window plane, exhibit identical cross-sections in the shape of a rightangle-triangle with a certain basic prism angle, are facing each other and are positioned such that just a small gap remains between the two panes. The lower rib faces of the outer prismatic pane are coated with a specularly reflecting layer and the upper rib faces of the inner prismatic pane are coated with a diffusely reflecting layer. The prismatic glazing unit can be used for common window tilt angles and for window directions with significant solar irradiation at sites with a temperate climate. It does not reduce the view to the outside appreciably and achieves — in comparison to other window panes — relatively uniform illumination of a room with daylight. During the summer and the transitional seasons it provides improved protection against solar irradiation and distinctly reduced irradiated heat fluxes. The reflecting surfaces of the prismatic ribs do not create glare.     

Perceived performance of daylighting systems: lighting efficacy and agreeableness

Can daylighting systems be assessed through objective procedures? On one hand, they can be considered as lighting techniques and deserve to be characterised through the same type of parameters: illuminances, uniformity, luminances, colour temperature, colour rendering indices, etc. On the other hand, two major aspects differentiate them from artificial lighting installations. Firstly, the daylight source is variable, requiring a long term approach and an assessment of the duration of the phenomena per day, month or year. Secondly, the brightness of the window cannot be totally disconnected from the content of the view and its agreeableness. This suggests that psychological well-being may be in some cases as important as visual comfort issues. For the window component industry, it appears that a serious concern about the two aspects of windows — i.e. lighting efficacy and agreeableness — should be carefully approached for each design.     

Passive solar systems for heating, daylighting and ventilation for rooms without an equator-facing facade

Spaces without northerly orientations have an impact on the ‘energy behaviour’ of a building. This paper outlines possible energy savings and better performance achieved by different zenithal solar passive strategies (skylights, roof monitors and clerestory roof windows) and element arrangements across the roof in zones of cold to temperate climates typical of the central and central-southern Argentina. Analyses were undertaken considering daylighting, thermal and ventilation performances of the different strategies. The results indicate that heating, ventilation and lighting loads in spaces without an equator-facing facade can be significantly reduced by implementing solar passive strategies. In the thermal aspect, the solar saving fraction reached for the different strategies were averaged 43.16% for clerestories, 41.4% for roof monitors and 38.86% for skylights for a glass area of 9% to the floor area. The results also indicate average illuminance levels above 500 lux for the different clerestory and monitor arrangements, uniformity ratios of 0.66–0.82 for the most distributed arrangements and daylighting factors between 11.78 and 20.30% for clear sky conditions, depending on the strategy. In addition, minimum air changes rates of 4 were reached for the most extreme conditions.     

PCM-facade-panel for daylighting and room heating

Double glazings combined with phase change materials (PCM) result in daylighting elements with promising properties. Light transmittances in the range of 0.4 can be achieved with such facade panels. Compared to a double glazing without PCM, a facade panel with PCM shows about 30% less heat losses in south oriented facades. Solar heat gains are also reduced by about 50%. This results in calculated U_eff-values of −0.3 to −0.5 W m⁻² K⁻¹, depending on PCM used. For an optimised panel, we calculated an U_eff-value of −0.6 W m⁻² K⁻¹. Although the U_eff-value of a double glazing is −0.8 W m⁻² K⁻¹, the PCM-systems may prove advantageous in lightweight constructed buildings due to their equalised energy balance during the course of day. Facade panels with PCM improve thermal comfort considerably in winter, especially during evenings. In summer, such systems show low heat gains, which reduces peak cooling loads during the day. Additional heat gains in the evening can be drawn off by night-time ventilation. If a PCM with a low melting temperature of up to 30 °C is used, thermal comfort in summer will also improve during the day, compared to a double glazing without or with inner sun protection. A homogeneous appearance of the PCM-systems is achievable by use of a concealment, like a screen-print glazing.     

A user-friendly procedure to visualize the hourly quantitative performance of daylighting systems

The paper reports on the academic experience of teaching daylighting to undergraduate architectural students. The case of teaching daylighting in the architectural professional program at Oklahoma State University is used as a case study. The paper provides a brief survey of the existing design-assisting tools and methods often used, in architectural education, to design and evaluate daylighting systems. These tools are the ones normally found in textbooks that are used to teach regular and/or advanced environmental control courses. As a result of the experimentation with the use of such handy methods in the architectural design studio, a limited benefit was observed. Although these tools can provide a good understanding of the issues and variables that may affect the performance of daylighting systems, students seldom use them in a design studio setting. In contrast, the suggested simplified procedure proved to be user-friendly. It was also found to be capable of visualizing the hourly performance of daylighting systems, and consequently building a comprehensive understanding of the performance of daylighting systems. This hands-on procedure provides quick and meaningful evaluation that can help students to further develop their daylighting designs to meet the predefined goals.The paper does not intend to present a new method of daylighting systems design and/or evaluation. However, it will present a procedure that helped architectural students to visualize, further develop, and comprehensively understand the performance of their daylighting designs.     

采用空间矢量调制方法的光伏并网系统滞环电流控制

文章研究了基于空间矢量调制概念的光伏并网系统滞环电流控制技术。该技术使用双滞环控制器获取电流误差信息,内滞环使输出电流在限定范围内,外滞环确定输出指令电压信号的空间位置。根据电流误差信号优化并网逆变器输出电压矢量,使误差电流信号变化速度降低,从而使逆变器的开关频率降低。该技术结合了空间矢量控制及滞环电流控制方法的优点,提高了逆变装置直流端的电压利用率,系统响应速度快,并且减少装置的散热及能量损失,使系统高效运行     

Silica aerogel granulate material for thermal insulation and daylighting

Silica aerogel granulate is a nanostructured material with high solar transmittance and low thermal conductivity. These properties offer exciting applications in building envelopes. One objective of the joint R&D project ISOTEG at ZAE Bayern was to develop and characterize a new glazing element based on granular silica aerogel. Heat transfer coefficients of less than 0.4 W/(m² K) and a total solar energy transmittance of 35% for the whole glazing unit were achieved. The glazing has a thickness of less than 50 mm. Another application for granular silica aerogel is, for example, in solar collectors.The thermal properties of the glazing as well as the optical and thermal properties of the granular aerogels are presented here. The solar transmittance of a 10 mm packed bed of silica aerogel was 53% for semi-translucent spheres and 88% for highly translucent granulate. In our heat transfer experiments the gas pressure, external pressure load, temperature and gas filling were varied. The various thermal conductivity values measured for the glazing and collector applications were compared to the values calculated using two different packed bed models. For the gas-dependent measurements the intergranular voids in the granulate were 1.0 ± 0.1 mm before loading the packed bed, 0.3 ± 0.1 mm at an external load of 3.2 bar (3.2 × 10⁵ Pa) and 0.6 ± 0.1 mm after release.A direct radiative conduction of λ_direct = 4.5 ± 0.5 × 10⁻³ W m⁻¹ K⁻¹ was obtained.     

Application of automated blind for daylighting in tropical region

This paper reports an experimental and simulation study on application of automated Venetian blind for daylighting in tropical climate. A horizontal blind system operating automatically under programmed control was constructed and integrated onto the glazed windows to form a window system with an automated blind in a room of a laboratory building. A dimming controller was also integrated to the lighting system of the room. Different operation schemes of the window system were devised and tested in the attempt to maximize energy savings while maintaining the quality of the visual environment in the room. Intensive measurement of illuminance of the interior space was undertaken during the experiments. A methodology for calculation of interior daylight illuminance and associated glare corresponding to the configurations of the experiments was adopted. The method was coded into a computer program. Results of calculation from the program agree well with those from experiments for all the schemes of operation conducted. The program was used to simulate the situation when each scheme of operation was implemented for a whole year. It was found that such window system with automated blind enabled energy savings of 80%, but a more sophisticated scheme also helped maintain the interior visual quality at high level.     

A technique for mapping global illuminance from satellite data

A technique for mapping global illuminance from satellite data was developed. A five-year (1998–2002) climatology of global solar illuminance obtained from this technique is presented for Thailand using hourly GMS-5 satellite data. The technique is based on a radiation budget model which traces solar radiation as it is scattered, absorbed and reflected back to space. The model produces an earth-atmospheric albedo in the satellite spectral window as well as global illuminance at the earth’s surface. The model is tuned using surface illuminance measurements at four stations in Thailand: Chiang Mai (18.78°N, 98.98°E), Ubon Ratchatani (15.25°N, 104.87°E), Songkhla (7.20°N, 100.60 °E) and Nakhon Pathom (13.82°N, 100.04°E). In the mapping process, a satellite earth-atmospheric albedo at any locations yields a cloud-atmospheric albedo in the satellite band, which is then transformed into a cloud-atmospheric albedo in the photopic band. Having obtained the photopic cloud-atmospheric albedo, the model calculates surface illuminance. The model gives a root mean square difference of 8.1% and a mean bias difference of −2.6% when tested against an independent data set. Monthly average maps are presented covering Thailand for local times of 10:30, 12:30 and 14:30.     

A model for calculating global illuminance from satellite data

A model for calculating global illuminance on horizontal surfaces from meteorological satellite data was developed. The data used for developing the model are global illuminance measured at four solar monitoring stations situated in different parts of Thailand and 8-bit digital data from visible channel of GMS-5 satellite covering the whole country for the period of 1–2 years. Values of normalized global illuminance defined as a ratio of global illuminance to clear sky global illuminance were calculated. These values were used to correlate with those of cloud index derived from the satellite data. From the correlation, a model relating the normalized global illuminance to cloud index was established. The performance of this model was investigated using an independent illuminance data set. It was found that the global illuminance calculated from the model agreed well with that obtained from the measurement, with a root mean square difference of 5.38 klux or 7.0% of the mean values.     

A hybrid ray-tracing and radiosity method for calculating radiation transport and illuminance distribution in spaces with venetian blinds

This paper presents a hybrid ray-tracing and radiosity method for processing luminous flux in spaces equipped with horizontal venetian blinds. The method considers both diffuse and specular characteristics of the blinds and aims to establish a balance between computational speed and accuracy. Direct components are treated with ray-tracing techniques employing a shining factor for the blinds to split between specularly and diffusely reflected components. The specular components are traced inside the blind cavity and inside the room while the direct-diffuse components inside the blind cavity are processed in a two-dimensional radiosity calculation until the final diffuse flux departing the cavity is determined. Diffuse-to-diffuse transmission is considered using a traditional radiosity method. Each room surface is divided into sub-surfaces and given an initial luminous exitance, after accounting for directly traced portions. Then a three-dimensional radiosity method is employed for the entire room to compute illuminance distributions on each sub-surface and on the work plane. Comparison between the current model and results obtained with full radiosity showed that significant errors can be introduced by improper modeling of blind specular components for almost all profile angles and slat angles.An in-depth analysis of the transmission process with different profile angles and shining factors showed the potential of blinds with diffuse characteristics to transmit more light than blinds with highly specular surfaces for certain angles. Further analysis for profile angle close to 45°, showed that for certain commonly used slat angles, a second reflection occurs at the bottom side of the upper slat, redirecting direct light towards the work plane, with serious potential glare consequences. The model contributes to rapid and accurate assessment of illuminance/solar radiation distribution in spaces with venetian blinds and related potential lighting energy savings when electric lighting controls are utilized. Analysis of the number of inter-reflections as a function of profile and slat angles with simultaneous consideration of different reflectances and shining factors is particularly important for providing guidelines and recommendations for venetian blinds optimized design and control.     

Interactions between louvers and ceiling geometry for maximum daylighting performance

The impact of ceiling geometries on the performance of louvers was investigated using physical model experiments and Radiance simulations. Two performance indicators, the illuminance level and its distribution uniformity, were used to assess daylighting performance in a room located in a subtropical climate region. It was found that the performance of the louvers can be improved by changing the ceiling geometry. The illuminance level increased in the rear of the room, and decreased in the front—near the window—compared to rooms having horizontal ceilings. Radiance results were found to be in good agreement with physical model data obtained under a clear sky and high solar radiation. Louvers' daylighting performance was reduced by tilting the louvers downward. The best ceiling shape was found to be one that is chamfered in the front and rear of the room.