The Effect of office design on workstation lighting: a simulation study

It has long been recognised that the lit environment in open-plan office space is influenced by the density and properties of the installed furniture. Indeed, the Lumen Method includes a procedure involving look-up tables to account for the effects of workstation size, partition height, and partition reflectance on the mean working-plane illuminance. As part of a larger project on openplan office environments, we used the Lightscape simulation tool to further explore the effect of office design on the lit environment in workstations. The office design variables of interest were workstation size, partition height, workstation reflectance, ceiling reflectance, and ceiling height. In addition to desktop illuminance, our outcome variables included illuminance distribution and partition luminance. We performed simulations for combinations of these parameters for fourteen common lighting designs for North American open-plan office space, including direct prismatic and parabolic luminaires, and indirect and direct/indirect luminaires. The results are expressed in simple linear or curvilinear relationships between office design variables and luminous variables. Results follow expected trends, and are consistent with previously published work in this area. Furthermore, in going beyond mean desktop illuminance, our results extend knowledge of the relationships between office design variables and the luminous environment.