Lighting performance in office buildings with BIPV facades: visual and non-visual effects

BIPV facades (integrated with opaque or transparent PV panels) have been accepted as an innovative strategy to provide electricity, reduce peak electrical and cooling demands, improve daylighting utilization, and achieve energy efficiency in buildings. This study presents a preliminary simulation study of impact of BIPV façades on visual and non-visual effects of daylight in an office building. DAYSIM and EVALGLARE, two advanced packages, were used to evaluate daylighting and visual performances. In general lighting and visual conditions can be expressed by the calculated Daylight Autonomy (DA) across the working plane and Daylight Glare Probability (DGP) at vertical planes of specific positions. The non-visual effect of lighting was indicated by the vertical DA at the same vertical positions. It has been found that BIPV facade configurations obviously affect both visual and non-visual performances of daylight. A balance of proper daylighting conditions and visual comfort should be a critical issue in the process of an office façade design.