Illumination Engineering

• Illumination engineering is necessary not only to understand the principles of light control as applied to
interior lighting design such as domestic and factory lighting but also to understand outdoor applications
such as highway lighting and flood lighting.
• The best illumination is that it produces no strain on the eyes.
• Good lighting has a strictly utilitarian value in reducing the fatigue of the workers, protecting their health,
increasing production, etc. The science of illumination engineering is therefore becoming of major
importance.
• Poor Lighting can cause: Eye Strain, Headache, Accidents due to insufficient lighting, and Glare.

 Nature of light
• Light is a form of electromagnetic energy radiated from the body and the human eye is capable of receiving it.
• Light is a prime factor in the human life as all activities of human being ultimately depend upon the light.
• The eye discriminates between different
wavelengths in this range by the sensation of
color. The whole of the energy radiated out is not
useful for illumination purpose.
Fundamentals :

 Light: It is defined as the radiant energy from a hot

body that produces the visual sensation upon the
human eye. It is expressed in lumen-hours and it
analogous to watt- hours, which denoted by the
symbol ‘Q’.

 Luminous flux: It is defined as the energy in the form

of light waves radiated per second from a luminous
body. It is represented by the symbol ‘φ’ and measured
in lumens.

 Radiant efficiency: the ratio of energy radiated in the

form of light, produces sensation of vision to the total
energy radiated out by the luminous body’
 Lumen: It is defined as the luminous flux emitted by a source of one candle power per unit solid angle
in all directions.

 Illumination: It is defined as the luminous flux received by the surface per unit area.

It is usually denoted by the symbol ‘E’ and is measured in lux or lumen/m2 or meter candle or foot
candle.

 Lamp efficiency: It is defined as the ratio of the total luminous flux emitting from the source to its
electrical power input in watts.
(lumen/W).
 Space to height ratio: It is defined as ratio of horizontal distance between adjacent lamps to the height of
their mountings.

 Utilization factor: It is defined as the ratio of total number of lumens reaching the working plane to the total
number of lumens emitting from source.
• Greater if the lamp fittings are cleaned regularly(0.8) If much dust is accumulated, it is 0.6
0.8 is chosen as a Maintenance factor.
 Depreciation factor: It is defined as the ratio of initial illumination to the ultimate maintained
illumination on the working plane.

Its value is always more

than 1.

Example 1: A room with an area of 6 × 9 m is illustrated by ten 80-W lamps. The luminous efficiency of the
lamp is 80 lumens/W, and the coefficient of utilization is 0.65. Find the average illumination.

Solution:

Room area = 6 × 9 = 54 m2.

Total wattage = 80 × 10 = 800 W.

Total flux emitted by ten lamps = 80 × 800 = 64,000 lumens.

Flux reaching the working plane = 64,000 × 0.65 = 41,600 lumens.

Illumination,
 Example 2: A surface inclined at an angle 40° to the rays is kept 6 m away from 150 candle power lamp.
Find the average intensity of illumination on the surface.

∴ Average illumination:
θ = (90° – 40°) = 50°.
 Lighting Schemes

1. Direct Lighting:-
• About 90% to 100%ofthetotal light flux is made to fall directly upon the working plane( falls
downwards)with the help of suitable reflectors. Most commonly used for internal lighting.
• Mainly used for Industry & general outdoor lighting.
• Disadvantage: Causes hard shadows and glare.

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2. Semi-Direct Lighting
• 60%-90% of the total light flux is made to fall directly downwards with the help of semi-direct
reflectors.
• Remaining light is used for illuminate ceilings and walls.
• It is used for general lighting where ceiling also should be illuminated
• Causes smoothing brightness.

3.IndirectLighting
• More than 90% of the total light flux is thrown upwards to the ceiling for diffused reflection by bowl reflectors.
• Causes soft, glare-free, diffused illumination.
• Used for decorative purposes in cinemas, hotels, theatres, etc.
• Advantage; It gives a glare free diffused light flux with soft shadows.
4. General Lighting
• In this method the bulb and the reflector are made of diffuse glass, so as to give uniform illumination in all
direction.
• Causes diffused and glare-less lighting, same illumination in all directions.
• Eg: Wall lights, Ceiling lights, dimmers and lower wattage lights, fluorescent lights.
 Types of Lamps
 Laws of Illumination
Mainly there are two laws of illumination.
1. Inverse square law.
2. Lambert's cosine law.
 Inverse square law
This law states that ‘the illumination of a surface is inversely proportional to the square of distance between
the surface and a point source’.
Proof:
Let, ‘S’ be a point source of luminous intensity ‘I’ candela, the luminous flux emitting from source crossing
the three parallel plates having areas A1, A2, and A3 square meters, which are separated by a distance of d, 2d, and
3d from the point source respectively as shown in Figure.

• For area A1, solid angle

• Luminous flux reaching the area A1 = luminous intensity × solid angle

∴ Illumination 'E1' on the surface area 'A1' is:

Similarly, illumination 'E2' on the surface area A2 is:

And illumination 'E3' on the surface area A3 is:

From the above three equations:

Hence, illumination on any surface is inversely proportional to the square of distance between the
surface and the source.
 Lambert's cosine law

This law states that ‘illumination, E at any point on a surface is directly proportional to the cosine of the
angle between the normal at that point and the line of flux’.

Proof:
While discussing, the Lambert's cosine law, let us assume that the surface is inclined at an angle ‘θ’ to
the lines of flux as shown in Figure.

PQ = The surface area normal to the source and

inclined at ‘θ’ to the vertical axis.

RS = The surface area normal to the vertical axis

and inclined at an angle θ to the source ‘O’.
Illumination of the surface

Illumination of the surface

Illumination of the surface

Substituting ‘d' from the above equation

• This law states that the ‘illumination at any point on a surface is dependent on the cube of cosine of the angle
between line of flux and normal at that point’.

• Note:

From the above laws of illumination, it is to be noted that inverse square law is only applicable for the surfaces
if the surface is normal to the line of flux. And Lambert's cosine law is applicable for the surfaces if the surface is
inclined an angle ‘θ’ to the line of flux.
Example 3: The illumination at a point on a working plane directly below the lamp is to be 60 lumens/m 2.
The lamp gives 130 CP uniformly below the horizontal plane. Determine:
1. The height at which lamp is suspended.
2. The illumination at a point on the working plane 2.8 m away from the vertical axis of the lamp

Solution:
Candle power of the lamp = 130 CP.
The illumination just below the lamp, E = 60 lumen/m2.
From the Figure, the illumination just below the lamp, i.e., at point A:

The illumination at point ‘B’:

 Example 4: The candle power of a source is 200 candela in all directions below the lamp. The mounting
height of the lamp is 6 m. Find the illumination:
1. Just below the lamp.
2. 3 m horizontally away from the lamp on the ground.
3. The total luminous flux in an area of 1.5-m diameter around the lamp on the ground.
Solution:
I = 200 candela. Mounting height (h) = 6 m.
1. The illumination just below the lamp, i.e., at
point 'A':

2. From the
figure
The illumination 3 m away from the lamp on the ground, i.e., at
point ‘B’
 3
.

The total flux reaching the area around the lamp:

Lighting Calculations (Lumen Method)
To determine the total number of luminaires required to produce a given illuminance by the lumen method we
apply the following formula:
Total number of luminaires (N) required to provide a chosen level of illumination (E) at a given surface is .

where
 E : the illuminance level is chosen after consideration of the IES code,
 A: the area is the working area to be illuminated,
 the lumen output of each luminaire is that given in the manufacturer’s specification and may be found by
reference tables.
 MF: is maintenance or (the light loss LLF) factor. This factor depends on the maintenance staff of the
building, but in general it is taken as 0.8 -0.9.
 Utilization factor (UF): The light flux reaching the working plane is always less than the lumen output of
the lamp since some of the light is absorbed by the various surface textures.
 The UF is expressed as a number which is always less than unity; a typical value might be 0.9 for a modern
office building.
Example 5:
It is proposed to illuminate a class room of dimensions 6 x 8 x 2.85 m to an illuminance (E) of 400 lx at the
bench level. The specification calls for luminaires having one 1050 mm 40 W fluorescent natural tube with an
initial output of 3200 lumens with white metal base and prismatic plastic diffuser (its UF is 0.57) . Determine
the number of luminaires required for this installation when the MF is 0.7, respectively. The reflection
coefficients are: (C= 0.70, W= 0.3, F=0.2)
Since 15 luminaire are large number that can be installed in the ceiling, so we suggest to use luminaire with
2x40 W fluorescent lamps with prismatic diffuser. Hence, the number of luminaire required will be,
Note: Usually we take the factor ½ when the dimensions of the room are such that the ratio of the length to
the width is less than 1.6, otherwise we take the factor of ⅓

Figure: Luminaires distribution on room ceiling

Example 6: A hall of 30 × 20 m area with a ceiling height of 6 m is to be provided with a general illumination
of 200 lumens/m2, taking a coefficient of utilization of 0.6 and depreciation factor of 1.6. Determine the
number of fluorescent tubes required, their spacing, mounting height, and total wattage. Take luminous
efficiency of fluorescent tube as 25 lumens/W for 300- W tube.
Solution:
Given data:
Area of hall

C DF = 1.6
The wattage of fluorescent tube = 300 W
Efficiency η = 25 lumens/W
Let us arrange 44 lamps in a 30 × 30 m hall, by taking 11 lamps along the length with spacing 30/11 = 2.727 m
and 4 lamps along the width with spacing 20/4 = 5m. Here the space to height ratio with this arrangement is,
2.727/5 = 0.545. Disposition of lamps is shown in Figure.

Figure: Lamp arrangement

Example 7 : A hall 40-m long and 16-m wide is to be illuminated and illumination required is 70-m candles. Five
types of lamps having lumen outputs, as given below are available.

Taking a depreciation factor of 1.5 and a utilization coefficient of 0.7, calculate the number of lamps required
in each case to produce required illumination. Out of above five types of lamps, select most suitable type and
design, a suitable scheme, and make a sketch showing location of lamps. Assume a suitable mounting height
and calculate space to height ratio of lamps
Solution:
Given data:
Area (A) = 30 × 12 = 360 m2
DF = 1.5 , CU = 0.7
E = 50-m candle

Total gross lumens required:

• Suitable type of lamp fitting will be 250-W lamps for a hall of 40 × 16 m.
• Here, 10 lamps are arranged in two rows, each row having 5 lamps. By taking 5 lamps along the length
with spacing 4058=m and 2 lamps along width side with spacing 16/2 = 8m, i.e., space to height ratio =
8/8 = 1.
• The disposition of lamps is shown in Figure.
 Figure: Lamp arrangement
• Among the other lamps, some of wattage lamps require more number of lamp fittings and some other lamps
will be few in requirement giving space–height ratio much more.