evaluation of daylighting performance, glare control, and thermal comfort using light shelves and internal louvers in office buildings

This study investigates the performance of light shelves and internal louvers in optimizing daylight distribution, mitigating glare, and enhancing thermal comfort within open-plan office spaces in tehran_iran. a comprehensive set of simulations—3,432 for light shelves and 5,964 for internal louvers—was conducted using advanced simulation tools, including rhino 7, grasshopper3d, honeybee, and ladybug tools. the research examines several key parameters, such as the window-to-wall ratio (wwr), shading device type, building orientation, and room dimensions. the findings reveal that light shelves significantly increase useful daylight illuminance (udi) by up to 72%, although they also raise annual sunlight exposure (ase) by 470%, which may contribute to glare. in contrast, internal louvers demonstrate greater effectiveness in reducing spatial visual discomfort (svd) and improving spatial glare autonomy (sga) by 12%, while also providing a slight increase in thermal comfort hours (tch) by 2.23% compared to windows without solar shading systems. increasing the wwr from 30% to 70% resulted in a 50% improvement in udi but caused a 31% decrease in tch. this study highlights the distinct benefits of each solar control system on indoor environmental quality and suggests that the integration of both systems be explored to achieve optimal performance.