Daylight Comfort - Introduction
We spend over 80% of our lives within buildings, with numerous studies demonstrating that access to daylight has profound implications for human health, happiness and productivity.
This conversely can impact the quality of life, happiness, sense of well-being, health (and healing), ability to learn in educational establishments, productivity at work, profitability and shopper-footfall in retail buildings.
As such, daylight has become an important strategy for improving building envelope climate-based design. Numerous worst-case and annualised design metrics are available to provide numerical goals within a design. Strategies to improve daylight may include:
Daylight-optimized building footprint
Climate-responsive window-to-wall area ratio
High-performance glazing
Daylighting-optimized fenestration design
Skylights (passive or active)
Tubular daylight devices
Daylight redirection devices
Solar shading devices
Daylight-responsive electric lighting controls
Daylight-optimized interior design (such as furniture design, space planning, and room surface finishes)
By providing better daylight, we both reduce reliance on artificial lighting to perform daytime activities and maximise the physiological and psychological well-being related to daylight access. By better regulating our circadian rhythms, greater daylight levels can lead to higher productivity and greater satisfaction within the internal environment.
For good design outcomes, designing for daylight considers subjective qualities, such as privacy and views to the outside, as well as objective and measurable qualities, such as energy use and the intensity of the daylight. When considering visual comfort, we consider illumination levels, daylight distribution, and protection against direct sunlight and glare.
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