This study deals with the effect of volumetric radiation on the natural convection in a square cavity containing an absorbing, emitting and scattering medium. Numerical simulation has been carried out using lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) with non-uniform lattices. Non-uniform lattices/control volumes have been implemented to deal with the sharp gradients and achieve reasonably accurate solutions. Separate equations dealing with different particle distribution functions in the LBM are used to calculate the density and velocity fields and the thermal fields. The finite volume method (FVM) is used to compute the radiative term of the energy equation. The results obtained in the present study is compared and validated against available results in literature. The centerline temperature across the cavity, the isotherms, the vertical velocity in the horizontal mid-plane, the horizontal velocity in the vertical mid-plane and the streamlines are studied for different parameters such as Rayleigh number, conduction-radiation parameter, extinction coefficient and scattering albedo. The results obtained by using the non-uniform lattices-based LBM are compared with the results for uniform lattice based-LBM. It is found that the non-uniform lattice-based LBM provides accurate results and it is computationally more efficient. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.