Energy-Efficient Future Electric Lighting for Buildings

Overview

Lighting-related electricity production for the year 1997 was 2016 TWh of which 1066 TWh was attributable to IEA member countries. Global lighting electricity use is distributed approximately 28 % to the residential sector, 48 % to the service sector, 16 % to the industrial sector, and 8 % to street and other lighting. For the industrialized countries national lighting electricity use ranges from 5 % to 15 %, while in developing countries the value can be as high as 86 % of the total electricity use. The corresponding carbon dioxide emissions were 1775 million tonnes, of which approximately 511 million tonnes was attributable to the IEA member countries.

More efficient use of lighting energy would limit the rate of increase of electric power consumption, reduce the economic and social costs resulting from constructing new generating capacity, and reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases and other pollutants. At the moment fluorescent lamps dominate the office lighting. In domestic lighting the dominant light source is still the more than a century old, inefficient incandescent lamp. New aspects of desired lighting are energy savings, daylight use, individual control of light, quality of light, emissions during life cycle and total costs.

The goal of Annex 45 is to identify and to accelerate the widespread use of appropriate energy efficient high-quality lighting technologies and their integration with other building systems, making them the preferred choice of lighting designers, owners and users.

The aim is to assess and document the technical performance of existing promising, but largely underutilized, innovative lighting technologies as well as future lighting technologies and their impact on other building equipment and systems (ie: daylighting, HVAC). These novel lighting system concepts have to meet functional, aesthetic, and comfort requirements of building occupants. The Annex intends to reach its objective by means of four research areas:

Targets for Energy Performance and Human Well-Being

The objective is to document the effect of design on energy use, lighting quality and human performance and give examples of good practice. The objective is to assess barriers preventing the adoption of energy-efficient, human friendly lighting design.

Innovative Technical Solutions

The objective is to identify, assess and document the performance, energy and economical criteria of existing promising and innovative future lighting technologies and their impact on other building equipment and systems. Purpose is to reduce the used energy in buildings by applying information on concepts and products and their effect on energy consumption and performance to consultants, public authorities and building owners.

Energy-Efficient Controls and Integration

The task will focus on controls that enable the occupant and facility manager to modify the electric lighting according to personal needs and preferences, within acceptable building operative requirements. Based on modern communication technology, personalisation and integration of these controls with other building systems will be an important part of the subtask.

Information Dissemination

The objective is to positively affect on the current lighting practices in a manner that accelerates the use of energy efficient products, improves overall building performance and enhances occupant's environmental satisfaction. The main target groups of deliveries are designers and end-users/owners. The results are disseminated also by delivering information to standards and recommendations and by providing educational material to educational institutions in order to positively affect future lighting professionals.