Toplighting provides outstanding opportunities for energy savings and improved quality of light inside many types of new and existing commercial buildings. This issue of e-News provides an overview of the benefits of toplighting, and describes brand-new requirements in California’s Building Energy Efficiency Standards for Non-Residential Buildings (Title 24) related to skylights and automatic controls.

Building owners can expect to reap considerable energy savings and other benefits in coming years as a result of these new requirements. For example, studies have found that retail stores with more skylighting have higher sales and lower energy costs. In 1999, Heschong Mahone Group, a Sacramento-area consulting firm that worked on the skylighting code changes, conducted a study funded by Pacific Gas and Electric Company that found a significant positive correlation between the presence of daylight in retail stores and higher sales.

Download eNews Issue #51