The effect of correlated colour temperature of lighting on thermal sensation and thermal comfort in a simulated indoor workplace

Abstract

The ‘hue-heat’ hypothesis states that an environment which has wavelengths predominantly toward the red end of the visual spectrum feels ‘warm’ and one with wavelengths mainly toward the blue end feels ‘cool’. In order to test the hypothesis and to study the impacts of the correlated colour temperature of a light source on thermal sensation and thermal comfort, a study was conducted in a test room illuminated with an Light Emitting Diode (LED) lighting system with an adjustable correlated colour temperature where air temperature, air velocity, and relative humidity were kept constant. The correlated colour temperature of lighting inside the test room was changed gradually while keeping the colour rendering index values greater than 90, an illuminance level of 500 lx, and chromaticity difference (Duv) values within the limits of ±0.005. Sixteen study subjects were exposed to a ‘high room temperature’ (25℃) and a ‘low room temperature’ (20℃) on different days. The subjects were adapted to low correlated colour temperature (2700 K), medium correlated colour temperature (4000 K), and high correlated colour temperature (6200 K) lighting for 10 min and subsequently completed the questionnaire about their thermal comfort and thermal sensation. The results of this survey did not provide support for the hue-heat hypothesis and indicated that people felt thermally more comfortable in an indoor workplace at the correlated colour temperature of 4000 K than at the correlated colour temperature of 2700 K or 6200 K.