1.0 Background
This project originated from the 2005 Technical Assistance (TA) Call for Projects from the U.S.
Department of Energy Federal Energy Management Program (FEMP). The General Services
Administration (GSA) Sunbelt Region requested guidance on energy efficient lighting in
courtrooms from a technical assistance team at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
(PNNL). Because the GSA Public Buildings Service Office of Applied Science (OAS) and the
Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts (AOUSC) were conducting similar work under a
separate contract, it was later determined to align the efforts, with the lighting energy analysis
conducted by PNNL and the data collection and engineering conducted by Ove Arup & Partners
Consulting Engineers PC (hereafter referred to as Arup Lighting).
The impetus of the project was related to frequent problems with courtroom lighting. The
question at hand was to determine the nature and source of the continuing problems and
determine the best course of action to fix the root cause. Was the basis of the problems the
guidance in the written criteria (or lack thereof), or the inability to apply the guidance correctly?
This report addresses these questions and provides a focus on achieving energy efficiency and
high quality courtroom lighting. To this end, the focus of Arup Lighting was primarily to gather
physical lighting measurements from six district courtrooms and determine what did or did not
work well with respect to lighting quality and the relationship to the design criteria. The focus of
the PNNL team was to perform a detailed analysis of the energy efficiency issues in consideration
of the lighting quality requirements and the complexities of design criteria, procurement and
construction by GSA. Arup Lighting and PNNL shared documentation and had meetings as
necessary to support their mutual goals in service of GSA, AOUSC and FEMP. The revised goal
of the effort was to provide guidance to GSA Public Building Service (PBS) and the AOUSC, in
the hopes of improving their design criteria in both lighting quality and energy efficiency. The
data collection and analysis by Arup Lighting is included in their report under separate cover.
1.1 Objectives
The objective of this work, with respect to lighting in courtrooms, is to accomplish the following:
(1) Determine the most frequent and significant lighting design problems, with respect to
both energy efficiency and lighting quality.
(2) Perform an energy analysis to determine the root cause for excess energy consumption.
(3) Recommend changes to lighting criteria, and provide relevant strategies to improve
lighting in courtrooms to improve energy efficiency and lighting quality.
March 2006
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