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2008 Study of Architecture Professionals on the Subject of Smart Glass, Daylighting and Clean Technology Part 1
Published: 2015-6-24 14:17:00


2008 Study of Architecture Professionals on the Subject of Smart Glass, Daylighting and Clean Technology
G.M. Sottile, Research Frontiers Incorporated, Woodbury, NY





ABSTRACT
Many opportunities now exist to use advanced materials,
products and processes that protect scarce resources and
enhance people’s quality of life. Interest in such clean technologies
is especially strong in the architectural community.
The United States Department of Energy reports that buildings
now account for nearly forty percent of all energy consumed
in the country, the highest level to date. To reduce buildings’
environmental impact, architects and others increasingly rely
on daylighting strategies that leverage the design and location
of windows, skylights and other glazings to reduce energy
consumption, improve human comfort, and marshal a resource
available to virtually everyone – natural light.
One of the most robust new categories of daylighting technologies
is smart glass. Smart glass is a growing category
of building materials that visibly change their light-control
properties in response to a stimulus. They offer unprecedented
daylighting benefits including the dynamic control of light,
glare and heat passing through windows and glazings. This
paper summarizes a market research study of architectural
professionals on the subject of smart glass as a clean technology
because of its daylighting potential.
INTRODUCTION
The modern movement of sustainable architectural design
continues to evolve. With roots in the ecology initiatives of
the late 1960s, pressing environmental concerns and growing
energy costs have transformed the movement into one of the
most pervasive forces in architectural design today. The pressure
toward sustainability is strong from many perspectives.
A growing number of developers, architects and homeowners
are motivated altruistically toward sustainable design. In their
opinion, sustainable building practices support the long-term
welfare of society and health of the planet. Many federal, state
and local initiatives complement these motivations through
the introduction of regulations and the promotion of incentives
designed to reduce energy consumption and encourage
greater use of renewable resources. Likewise, technology
developers and their respective investors continue to devote
substantial amounts of time and capital toward research and
the commercialization of innovative solutions that profitably
address the growing desire to “go green.”

SUSTAINABILITY AND CLEAN TECHNOLOGY
Historically, a holistic view of sustainability has existed. In
1987, the Brundtland Commission, formerly the World Commission
on Environment and Development convened by the
United Nations, claimed “Development is sustainable when
it meets the needs of the present without compromising the
ability of future generations to meet theirs” [1]. Within this
viewpoint, sustainable initiatives are evident along multiple
dimensions and with growing frequency. From the design of
energy efficient buildings and automobiles to the more localized
commitments for open space preservation, sustainability
is an emerging point of commonality among governments,
organizations and individuals worldwide.
Sustainable architectural design, often referred to as “green
building,” involves practices that increase the efficiency of
buildings, support the health and well being of building occupants,
and minimize the impact that buildings have on the
environment. It is in these areas that the drive toward sustainability
is especially pronounced and with apparent justification.
For example, according to the U.S. Green Building Council,
buildings in the United States account for 39% of energy use,
71% of electricity consumption, 40% of non-industrial waste
and 38% of carbon dioxide emissions [2].
The concept of clean technology is a recent manifestation
of the movement toward sustainable design. Inclusive of
a range of products and processes across many industries,
clean technology integrates the ideals of sustainability with
profit-making objectives. The Cleantech Network describes
clean technology as “new technology and related business
models offering competitive returns for investors and
customers while providing solutions to global challenges”
[3]. Investments in the development of clean technologies
have accelerated recently, with spending in 2007 projected
to increase 14% from the prior year and surpass $55 billion
globally [4]. Similarly, venture capital investments in clean
technology are growing strongly. Such investment in North
America totaled $2.9 billion in 2006, a 78% increased from the
prior year. Further, during 2006, energy-related investments
represented 74% of total venture capital investments made in
clean technology [5]. The infusion of equity investments into
clean technology is occurring at a time of growing societal
and government demands for proactive action with regard to



sustainability. As these forces converge, it is likely the costs
for sustainable products and processes will decrease, thus
availing such innovations to a larger number of end-users.
This appears to the case with photovoltaic (PV) technology,
a renewable energy innovation that has existed for several
decades but has not experienced a sizeable upturn in production
until fairly recently. Since 2002, production of photovoltaics
has doubled every two years, making it the fastest-growing
energy source in the world [6]. Looking ahead, some expect
that PV technology will achieve grid parity – the point at which
the lifetime costs of acquisition and usage are equivalent to
electricity costs from conventional sources such as a utility
– within two years [7].
Interest in sustainable living has existed for millennia. Many
cultures through history have survived and thrived because
of responsible stewardship of their natural resources. Today,
an inflection point in the evolution of sustainable architectural
design appears to have been reached. With buildings
accounting for substantial amounts of resource consumption
and environmental impact, heightened interest within the
design community and a growing set of innovative solutions
offered by industry are making sustainability an achievable
objective.
DAYLIGHTING
There are few conditions in the history of humankind as pervasive
as the need for natural light and the desire to control it.
Daylighting involves the purposeful introduction of natural
light, also known as daylight, into the interior of a building.
Varying perspectives on daylighting exist within this broad
context. In a study of mostly North American and Australian
design professionals, an architectural definition of daylighting
that involves “the interplay of natural light and building form
to provide a visually stimulating, healthful, and productive
interior environment” was deemed the most relevant. However,
daylighting definitions pertaining to other orientations such
as lighting energy savings and building energy consumption
also were considered relevant to some [8].
The strategic application of daylighting primarily involves
shading from the sun, protection from glare and the redirection
of natural light [9]. Studies examining the effect of daylighting
strategies signal both economic and human benefit. Properly
designed daylighting systems in retail, educational and workplace
settings have been associated with dramatic increases
in individual well being and productivity [10]. This is consistent
with pioneering research on windows and their effect
on building occupants. Collins (1975), for example, reported
that a building’s windows were typically mutli-functional. In
addition to offering a view to the outside, windows offered
occupants aesthetic advantages, enhanced psychological states
and other positive benefits [11].

The sun provides bountiful energy. Harvesting this energy
through daylighting strategies offers the opportunity to reduce
the use of interior electric lighting, lower heating and
cooling costs, increase occupant well being and health, and
minimize environmental impact. Driven by a combination
of energy efficiency goals and human well being desires,
demand for daylighting solutions is growing. Some of these
solutions are passive in nature and involve decisions as
fundamental as the siting of a building or the size and placement
of conventional windows. Others are of a more active
nature, integrating daylighting products and processes with
computerized building controls systems. Effective use of
both active and passive solutions will help to advance the
sustainability of buildings.
SMART GLASS
Smart glass is a category of materials whose light-control
properties change in response to a stimulus [12]. Also known
as chromogenics, switchable glass and dynamic glazings, a
growing number of smart glass products exist ranging from
aerospace windows to automotive sunroofs and mirrors. In
the architectural application, smart glass can be integrated into
windows, doors, skylights, partitions, light tubes and other
products. Control systems, as basic as a simple switch or more
advanced using ambient light or temperature sensors, allow
building operators and occupants to adjust the light-transmission
properties of smart glass, a major advancement over
conventional windows that typically must be supplemented
with view-blocking and space-consuming blinds or shades
to control light transmission. Sleek, easy to maintain and
requiring very low amounts of energy to operate, smart glass
also permits dynamic light-control while preserving the view
to the outside, a desired property but one that is typically not
available from conventional shading systems. Most importantly
to many, smart glass can reduce energy demands for
interior lighting and heating, ventilation and air conditioning
systems. The outlook for smart glass is especially strong, with
the Freedonia Group projecting that the dollar value of smart
glass demand in the United States will reach $1.34 billion in
2015, a 250% increase from 2005 [13].
Two broad segments of smart glass exist. Passive smart glass
has no electrical interface, reacting instead to other stimuli
such as ultraviolet light. Photochromic eyewear is an example
of passive smart glass. The larger of the two segments, and
that which is experiencing the greatest interest from many
industries, is active smart glass. The light transmission properties
of active smart glass change in response to changes in
an electrical stimulus. Included among the set of active smart
glass are three unique types of active smart glass technology,
each with its own distinct chemistry and performance
characteristics. In architectural settings, liquid crystal (LC)
smart glass is primarily used for interior applications such
as partitions where privacy is occasionally needed. Tunable



in milliseconds and offered with two states – transparent
and translucent – LC smart glass diffuses incoming light
and offers essentially complete privacy, but it provides only
nominal shading benefit. Suspended particle device (SPD)
smart glass is a shading system that can block 99.4% or more
of incoming visible light, a level that is approximately 20 to
40 times darker than typical window tints. Clear state levels
are almost as light-transmissive as an ordinary window,
and SPD smart glass is tunable within seconds to any point
between dark and clear. Thus, users can achieve privacy in
the dark state, peak light transmission and visibility of the
outside in the clear state, and varying degrees of shading and
view preservation in intermediate states. Electrochromic (EC)
smart glass is similar to SPD smart glass in that it offers light
transmission states from dark to clear. Of all the active smart
glass technologies, EC smart glass is the slowest to switch,
with architectural EC smart glass often taking many minutes
to change its light-control properties. The switching speed of
EC smart glass also is disproportionately slower as panel size
increases. As such, architectural EC smart glass is typically
offered with two states, shaded and clear.
Active smart glass offers architectural designers a very
powerful tool in their quiver of energy efficient daylighting
strategies. Perhaps most fundamentally, smart glass transforms
conventional windows into devices with unprecedented lightcontrol
properties. Traditionally, architectural windows were
integrated with standard blinds, shades or curtains to provide
light-control for those times when shading or privacy was
desired. In such events, one of windows’ primary utilities
– occupant views to the outside – was diminished by these
view-blocking treatments. Except in its most heavily tinted
states, smart glass offers dynamic shading, glare reduction
and solar control without loss of view.
Smart glass also can be combined with non-dynamic glazings
to offer a blended approach to daylighting strategy.
For example, multiple windows with different performance
features could serve a single interior space. In a modestly
sized office, for example, glazings near the ceiling could be
integrated with exterior reflective light shelves that would
supply natural light deep into the room. Below this glazing
would be a larger smart glass panel that preserves one’s
view while adjusting to changes in exterior light conditions
or control system parameters, thus protecting against solar
radiation and excessive glare while also supporting natural
light needs for one’s more immediate work area.
Finally, because of its electrical interface, active smart glass
also offers a great leap forward in terms of integration with
intelligent building systems. While many daylighting strategies
strive for ongoing penetration of natural light, some of these
strategies are hindered by the fact that penetration of natural
light into a building’s interior occurs even when areas such
as discrete office space or others rooms are unoccupied. By

using photocells or other types of advanced control systems,
daylight can be introduced reliably into these interior spaces
only when rooms are occupied, thus providing desired occupant
benefits while also more efficiently managing heat gain and
its attendant demands on a building’s cooling systems.
SURVEY OF ARCHITECTURE PROFESSIONALS
Introduction and Methodology
This is the first market research study to examine the attitudes
of architecture professionals on the subject of smart glass,
daylighting and clean technology. Because of its empirical
nature, it offers the building industry and related constituents
a series of benchmarked metrics against which future results
can be compared.
The population for this study is United States LEED?? Accredited
Professionals who cite “architecture” as their practice
area. LEED is an acronym for Leadership in Energy and
Environmental Design, a program of the U.S. Green Building
Council (USGBC). The USGBC, which administers this
program that results in the rating of buildings along a number
of measures, accredits professionals who are involved in various
facets of the design and operation of buildings. To many
industry participants, LEED is the primary accreditation and
rating system in architecture today, and it is widely acknowledged
for its success in advancing sustainability.
In January 2008, an email communication was sent to 10,407
of these professionals. The email requested participation in
the study and provided a link to an online survey. Receipt of
a summary of the study’s results was offered as an incentive
to participate. Through mid-February, a total of 1,510 usable
surveys were submitted, resulting in a 14.5% response
rate and a margin of error (??=0.05) of +/- 2.5%. To address
non-response bias, responses were weighted by the region
of the country to which respondents belong in a manner
that reflected the distribution observed for the population of
professionals.
Respondent Profile
Of the architecture professionals surveyed, 80.9% claim they
have been LEED Accredited Professionals for two years or
less. Approximately ninety one percent are employed by an
architectural, design or engineering firm, and 50.7% are licensed
architects. In terms of the focus of their work, 94.6%
and 54.3% claim they are involved with commercial and
residential projects, respectively. Of those surveyed, 84.1%
say they have been involved with sustainable design projects
in the past year and fully 32.2% claim to have evaluated,
recommended or specified solar power such as photovoltaics
in the past 12 months.
Attitudes Regarding Sustainable Design
Respondents were asked to identify the three most important
items to consider when evaluating the sustainability of




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