Window blind operations and their relationship with environment factors and occupant's behaviour in a green-certified office building in Malaysia
There is a need to understand the correlations between window blind operations with the environmental factors and occupants’ behaviour to improve the indoor visual environment and daylight performance of office buildings in Malaysia. Improper positioning and seldom use of window blinds can ham...
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| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2019
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/98007/1/FRSB%202019%2019%20UPM%20IR.pdf |
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| Summary: | There is a need to understand the correlations between window blind operations
with the environmental factors and occupants’ behaviour to improve the indoor
visual environment and daylight performance of office buildings in Malaysia.
Improper positioning and seldom use of window blinds can hamper the
penetration of daylight into office buildings, which may cause high electricity
consumption and poor indoor visual environment. According to some studies,
many of the existing office buildings in Malaysia are consuming high amount of
electricity, partly because the occupants leave the window blinds fully lowered
and depend on artificial lightings during daytime. Furthermore, the real reasons
behind, and the influential factors of, occasional blind operation are still unknown
for countries with hot and humid climatic condition. Therefore, this study aims to
explore the behaviour of green office building’s occupants regarding their control
of window blinds as well as to investigate the manual blind use patterns and their
correlations with the building orientations, sky conditions, floor levels and time of
the day. The main objectives are, 1) to analyse how and why the office occupants
operate their window blinds through a questionnaire survey among occupants;
2) to determine whether building façade orientations, sky conditions, different
floor levels, and time of the day, influence the level of occlusion and the
frequency of window blinds adjustment; and 3) to examine how window blinds
are affecting occupants’ visual comfort level. A GBI Gold-certified office building
in Putrajaya was selected as a case study building for this study. This study used
time-lapse photography to record the positions of the blinds. A questionnaire
survey was also conducted among the building occupants to deepen
understanding of their views on window blind operation. The Spearman’s
Correlation and ANOVA tests were conducted for the statistical analysis of the
blind positions in relation to the different environmental factors. The responses
obtained from the survey were analysed using descriptive and cross-tabulation
analyses. The Spearman’s Correlation and ANOVA tests revealed that the
positioning and movements of the window blinds were correlated with the building orientations and floor levels and sometimes with the sky conditions.
However, no relationship was found between the window blind operation and
time of the day. The survey results revealed that most of the occupants did not
operate their window blinds frequently, and glare from the daylight and outside
views were the two main reasons for closing and opening their blinds
respectively. The results indicate that there was a lack of willingness among
occupants to operate their window blinds frequently throughout the day, which
may result in poor daylight condition and high dependency on the artificial
lightings. It is expected that findings of this study will contribute to further studies
on window blind operation involving more office buildings in the tropics to ensure
good indoor visual environment. It is hoped that this study will help to raise
awareness among building occupants and encourage them to operate their
window blinds frequently to better utilise the available daylight and to reduce the
usage of artificial lightings. |
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