Experimental validation of the BAC factor method for lighting systems

In the last few years, many buildings have been equipped with Building Automation and Control (BAC) systems. BAC systems can be used to achieve a significant reduction of the electrical consumption and to have all the well acknowledged benefits from the daylight (e.g. occupant comfort, health, well-being and productivity). For this reason, Standard EN 15232 'Energy performance of buildings - Impact of Building Automation, Controls and Building Management' puts into evidence the importance of the presence of BAC and Technical Building Management (TBM) systems, suggests a classification of these systems, explains their main functionalities and presents a simplified method to estimate their impact on the energy consumption of the building. The aim of this paper is to verify this simplified BAC factor method using the results of an experimental measurements campaign. In the paper, the BAC factors are evaluated for a residential and an office environment, using a big set of data measured for one year every 5 minutes at the laboratory of the DEIM (University of Palermo), where a BACs for lighting control is installed.