Objective Measurements of Comfort: Daylight in Workplace

JeeEun Lee (Cornell University)

The concept of sustainability in the built environment can be oversimplified to saving energy. The effort for energy reduction provides quantitatively straightforward evidence to persuade stakeholders and execute so-called sustainable buildings. While energy consumption got excessive attention over the last decades, the importance of occupant comfort in the built environment left vague. The real meaning of sustainability of built environments can be realized only with high satisfaction of occupants because the underutilized, efficient spaces are useless. In this vein, The efficiency of buildings should not compromise the comfort of occupants. Unlike the energy consumption, the satisfaction and comforts of occupants are difficult to grant objective evidence that is useful over the decision-making process of building design. Some assessment tools of satisfaction, such as Post Occupancy Evaluation (POE), are useful but do not support decision makings with quantitative variables. In order to delve into the occupant comfort, this study focuses on daylight conditions in the workplace. Previous studies demonstrated that daylight has noteworthy impacts on occupants, in terms of working performance as well as their well-being. Although daylight availabilities are easily predicted with environmental simulation tools, it does not provide sufficient evidence of how occupants are satisfied or comfortable in the built environment, especially in the new dynamics of flexible working environments. This study suggests potential technologies to collect the satisfaction and comfort data of occupants and how the data of occupants will be implied to the future building design process.