An investigation of daylighting performance and energy saving in a daylit corridor

Daylighting has often been recognised as a useful source of energy savings in buildings. For daylit spaces, daylight-linked automatic lighting control can give excellent energy savings. The evaluation of energy efficiency due to daylighting is best demonstrated by case studies. This paper presents field measurements on daylighting for a fully air-conditioned daylit corridor. Electric lighting load, brightness of the fluorescent luminaires, daylight illuminance levels and the room parameters affecting daylighting designs were recorded and analysed. Traditional daylighting theories have been applied to illustrate how well daylighting measures can perform in reality. It has been found that energy savings in electric lighting was about 70% using dimming control system. The results from this study provide some operational and energy performance data, which would be useful and applicable to other interior spaces with similar architectural designs. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.