Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

Thick and multilayered glazings generally have a nonuniform distribution of absorbed solar radiation which is not taken into account by current methods for calculating the center of glass solar gain and thermal performance of glazing systems. This paper presents a more accurate method for calculating the distribution of absorbed solar radiation inside thick and multilayered glazings and demonstrates that this can result in a small but significant difference in steady-state temperature profile and Solar Heat Gain Coefficient for some types of glazing systems when compared to the results of current methods. This indicates that a more detailed approach to calculating the distribution of absorbed solar radiation inside glazings and resulting thermal performance may be justified for certain applications.