Abstract
Purpose: Due to recent increase on energy consumption for light in building, many studies to mitigate this issue have been conducted. Various researches have been carried out to suggest light shelf as one of the solutions, but researches for its reflectivity is very few. In fact, existing research on light shelf shows that utilizing more than 90% of high-illumination materials causes imbalance of glare and illuminance. Method: Therefore this research aimed to evaluate the performance of light shelves depending on reflectivity and to identify proper solution through test-bed. Result: The results are following: 1) Increased reflectivity generally contributed to increase of indoor illuminance but degrade uniformity factor related with indoor comfort of light environment. 2) The $0^{\circ}fixed$ light shelf with 75% of reflectivity and width of 300mm and 40mm appeared to consume more energy than other shelves. Therefore, it is analyzed as unsuitable. 3) This research was conducted by calculating appropriate angle of light shelf around winter and summer solstices and vernal/autumnal equinox. Based on this, performance evaluation was undertaken depending on reflectivity of movable light shelf, which is activated by external sources and can be applied with lower reflectivity than fixed shelf. However, one exception was a movable shelf with width of 600mm that increased light energy consumption when 75% of reflectivity was applied. 4) Performance evaluation of fixed and movable light shelf showed that the shelf with 80% of reflectivity came up with suitable results, but 75% of reflectivity may be applied depending on the width and angle of the shelf. This research is meaningful in that estimation of appropriate reflectivity of light shelf can resolve the glare problem and improve light environment, and further research would be desirable under more diverse conditions to identify proper solution.
