A paper by the Integrated Design Lab, authored by Amir Nezamdoost, Alen Mahic, and Kevin Van Den Wymelenberg has been accepted in 2014 IES Annual conference and presented by Amir and Alen in a 30-minute paper session at IES Conference in Pittsburgh, PA. The paper titled “ANNUAL ENERGY AND DAYLIGHT IMPACTS OF MANUAL BLIND CONTROL ALGORITHMS”. The conference paper can be downloaded from link below:

Annual Energy and Daylight Impacts of Manual Blind Control Algorithms

ABSTRACT: Manual blind controls are typically not included in energy modelling and often not considered in daylight modelling. This is in part because there is no consensus in the research or practice community about the way users operate manual blinds. Recently the IES published LM-83 for annual daylight simulation and this document includes a preliminary manual blind control algorithm. A subsequent literature review proposed two alternate manual blind control strategies. Blind control patterns affect the energy consumption (interior lighting loads and space heating and cooling loads) of buildings but a deeper understanding of the range of effects is needed before widespread adoption of manual blind control algorithms in daylighting and energy simulation will occur or consensus about appropriate algorithms reached. This paper compares three leading candidate manual blind control algorithms using a three-story medium-sized office building located in Boise ID. Simulations were conducted using BCVTB co-simulation program to integrate Radiance engine V.4.2.0 with thermal modelling program EnergyPlus V.8.1.0. Specifically, annual energy implications, blind average daily rate of change (ROC), average daily number of blind movements (NBM), blind occlusion (percent of windows with blinds closed) and spatial daylight autonomy (sDA), are compared for all three algorithms. It is reported that annual lighting end-use energy consumption of three strategies differed by approximately 6.6%, 3.7% and 2.2% using Blindswitch-A, -B and LM-83 respectively as compared to a baseline with blinds always retracted with daylight sensing lighting controls. The LM-83-based manual control algorithm has the highest ROC and NBM of the three leading candidate manual blind control algorithms. The highest blind occlusion was reported for Blindswitch-A for all facades. Blindswitch-A shows slightly more overall energy consumption as compared to the other two algorithms, having 1.3% higher use than the baseline with lighting controls and blinds retracted. However, the real energy story is told in the variance in energy end uses for the alternate blind control models as compared to the baseline (exceeding 20% difference).