Abstract:
One of the most important concerns when designing buildings as liveable spaces is the indoor comfort. This
depends on different factors, including daylight availability and discomfort glare conditions.
The increasing use of glazing areas in the building’s envelopes can lead to high energy consumption and
problems such as visual discomfort. The use of shading devices stands out as a sustainable design strategy to
reduce energy consumption in the buildings. This work presents an experimental analysis of the impact of an
innovative shading device, a double-tilted venetian blind (DTVB) with different positions of upper and lower
slats, on the indoor daylight conditions. Moreover, discomfort glare evaluation, through DGPs metric, is
performed.
The experimental campaign was conducted in an outdoor test cell during three periods of the year: summer
solstice, winter solstice and autumn equinox. Experiments were carried out with both white and grey DTVBs, for
several positions of upper and lower slats, under clear and overcast sky conditions. This comprises the measurement of indoor and outdoor horizontal and vertical illuminances and irradiances and solar and visible
transmittance of the fenestration. It was concluded that DTVBs can achieve a higher performance, regarding solar protection, daylighting and glare control, when compared with more traditional venetian blinds systems.