Lighting is a primary target for energy savings, because of its largest individual use of power. Lighting is responsible for 25-40 percent of energy consumption.

Natural light

A well designed zero energy home maximizes the use of natural lighting.

Benefits of natural light:

• visual – Natural light also provides a perfect white light
• health benefits
• financial benefits – the energy savings could be considerable by allowing more natural light to penetrate and controlling both its light and heat components

Possible negative aspects of natural lighting:

• glare
• overheating
• limited variability
• privacy issues due to transparent materials
• reduced insulation value of windows – unless the zero energy home is specifically designed to utilize passive solar heating, energy saving windows should not exceed 15% of the wall area because they have a lower insulation value than walls.

Solar tubes

Solar tubes are not skylights. Solar tubes refracts and reflects the sun’s light into zero energy home, decreasing the need for artificial lighting. They can be installed in most homes providing natural light and reducing energy bills for lighting.

How solar light tubes work?

solar light tube

Solar tubes capture sunlight on the roof through a small dome and reflect the light down a tube. Light is then bounced through a coated metal tube to a diffuser lens in the ceiling. They simply convey sunlight through the roof to the inside of the house

How to install solar light tubes?

Irving Independent School Districtl will be the largest net zero energy school in the United States. It has selected GridPoint, Inc. to install a more than 500 kilowatt solar panel system. It is specifically designed for commercial rooftops, offering a low weight, non-penetrating mounting system, superior wind and soiling performance. The photovoltaic surface will maximize the 150,000 square foot school’s roof space to ensure generation exceeds consumption.

The solar energy system of this zero energy building will feature an intelligent energy monitoring system to record and display and analyse energy production through a web-interface.

An energy efficient commercial building uses about 60% to 70% less energy than an average commercial building. Buildings can meet this target by improving building envelope design, efficient material, innovations in design and technologies. On the other hand, in addition to reduced energy cost they generate energy through renewable sources and other smart technologies.

Laboratories, universities, and research companies worldwide conduct zero energy commercial buildings research. These efforts are focused on defining zero energy -Efficient Buildings, Energy Use Assessment, Performance Metrics and Reference Buildings. The lessons learned from this research helps to understand the zero energy design, operation construction and evaluation of the current low energy commercial buildings. To achieve this goal it is important to engage commercial building constructors, architects, engineers operators, builders and owners from the public and private sectors to ensure these zero energy technologies are market-ready.