Interior Shading

Interior or indoor shades are used most commonly in buildings to control sunlight, heat, glare, views, and privacy. Indoor shades can improve thermal comfort by blocking sunlight from hitting occupants and reducing radiant temperature asymmetry between room and window surfaces. They can also reduce glare and potentially enhance daylight through the combined use of materials, geometry, zoning, and positioning. Because interior shades can be installed at fairly low cost (compared to window replacement), these attachments are a practical solution for retrofit applications. Researchers at LBNL have been working with industry to characterize and measure performance of innovative, commercial systems and develop new systems that provide a more optimal balance between competing performance objectives.

Left: Slats in the upper clerestory zone can be set to a different angle than the slats in the lower view zone, allowing daylight to be admitted in the clerestory region when the lower region is closed to control glare.  A low-e surface on the underside of the lower blind can reduce radiative heat transfer to the interior to improve thermal comfort.  Right: Prismatic materials can be used in louvered systems (linear prisms run parallel to the edge of the slat) to refract sunlight upward to the ceiling plane.