Assessment of daylight performance of Advanced Daylighting Strategies in Large University Classrooms; Case Study Classrooms at JUST

Abstract

Daylight in buildings helps to reduce energy consumption, lower negative impacts on the environment, improve human performance and increase the productivity. The current research aimed at studying the effect of advanced daylight technologies, like; lightshelf, anidolic systems, translucent materials and lightshelf combined with external reflectors, on daylight performance and visual environment in university classrooms. The current research was conducted on a classroom located in the lecture halls complex at Jordan University of Science and Technology (JUST). These daylight technologies were assessed for indicators; illuminance level, uniformity and energy saving. The research used real time experiments and IES-VE, the advanced simulation tool, to study how different daylight technologies would improve daylight illuminance levels and uniformity distribution. The results insured that these technologies could provide a significant increase in the illuminance levels to match the standards in the area of low illuminance level, improve the uniformity distribution and lower rates of discomfort glare. Results also indicated that energy consumption reduced in the classrooms by an average of 40–50% of energy used for lighting. Lightshelf, anidolic systems and windows in rear parts to the glazed corridor performed better in term of increasing light level in the rear part by an average of more than 100%.