Natural versus artificial lighting use in an office building under clear sunny skies

Under clear sunny skies, a building requires more knowledge in terms of architectural daylighting design because of the complexity of the phenomenon and the wide variety of its parameters and impacts. This study focuses on office employees' behaviour in relation to natural and/or artificial lighting and investigates the relationships between: i) the natural/artificial lighting use, ii) the perceptual views induced/generated by the related internal luminous environment, iii) the impact of the external natural luminous environment on the recourse to natural and/or artificial lighting, iv) the office conformation, v) the internal movable shading devices use, and vi) the users' characteristics. This POE investigates an office building located in the city of Biskra in Algeria, where a clear and sunny sky combined with a hot arid climate prevails. The study results revealed that: i) the office employees perceive daylight somehow differently from their attitude towards it, ii) the window location and some of the users' characteristics dictate artificial lighting usage, iii) no direct relationships were found between the use of the movable shading devices and the recourse to the artificial lighting, whilst vi) the impact of the external natural luminous environment on the use of the movable shading devices was confirmed.