Specialty and Architectural Lighting — LED

Over two years ago, when we wrote this original post, there was general angst from lighting designers, contractors and owners about the usefulness of LED MR16 bulbs as viable replacements for halogen MR16 in commercial display lighting applications. At the time, we cited a USDOE report from 2014 that showed "very few of the LED MR16 lamps listed in the LED Lighting Facts program are comparable replacements for the popular 12V 50W halogen MR16". Only...

Effective lighting for retail stores focuses on two concepts: entice shoppers to enter the store and, once they are in the store, direct their attention to the merchandise. This basic formula gets more complex, depending on the store, with the need to find a balance with other important issues such as energy use, maintenance costs, heat and UV generated by the lighting. A winning lighting strategy accomplishes the primary goal of getting shoppers in the...

Facility managers faced with a lamp replacement project may want to consider the LED option but worry about the reliability of the technology, higher initial costs and a predictable return on investment. Bosses may require convincing that now is the right time to adopt LED lighting for their facility. While we are well past the "early adopter" phase of the new technology adoption curve, familiarity with the LED light source and its benefits may still...

Lighting, one of the key components of the overall customer experience when dining out, provides the restaurant owner with the benefits of aesthetic appeal along with the hassle of ongoing maintenance requirements and potentially high energy costs. The emergence of LED lighting offers restaurant owners an opportunity to maintain or enhance the lighting environment in their restaurant while reducing operating expenses. In some cases this means only deciding to purchase equivalent LED bulbs instead of...

A study by Rutgers University indicates that cheaper, more efficient lighting may lead to more lighting being used by consumers and institutions. One likely result -- people will use more lights if they are cheaper to operate, which won't reduce the overall energy usage. According to an article from InsideClimateNews summarizing the findings, the cost of LEDs will keep coming down due to a switch from rare earth elements (REEs) to earth-abundant materials that are...

Currently, T8 fluorescent tubes dominate the commercial and institutional lighting sector both in number of lamps and in lumen output. The USDOE estimated in 2010 that there were 1 billion fluorescent fixtures in the U.S. It is no surprise that LED manufacturers have focused on this potentially huge retrofit market with a large number of LED options. Unlike other LED replacement bulbs, T8 tubes have some subtle, but critical differences in how they are installed....

Cities and states can enjoy numerous benefits by switching from high pressure sodium to LED lights in street lighting fixtures and traffic signal lights. These benefits included better visibility for drivers, lower power consumption for street lights, and reduced maintenance when compared to the old lighting technology. On the negative side, switching from yellow light to the whiter LEDs has the effect of keeping people awake at night, depending on their proximity to the light...

We recently received an email from a reader pointing to the fact that many details are glossed over or left out in articles about how to buy LED bulbs to replace existing incandescent or halogen in homes. We'll give it another try in this article. With incandescent bulbs, when they burn out, you look at the watts printed on the bulb. That's basically all you need to know to buy a new incandescent bulb that...

If there are still doubts about the long-term impact of the LED lighting revolution, the upcoming Super Bowl should eliminate the skeptics. It's one thing to put an LED bulb in a table lamp. But use them to light a massive football stadium? It is true. Every second of the most watched sporting event in America will be under new LED sports light fixtures recently installed in the U. of Phoenix Stadium. By all accounts...

LED light bulbs, it seems, are like old cowboys, they never die, they only ride off into the sunset. Exaggeration? Maybe. But it brings up an important point. LED light bulbs do eventually go dark, but the process takes so long it seems like forever. A Fistful of Rated Hours So when buying an LED and you see a rated life, what does it mean? The expected life of most traditional light bulbs is based...

You'd think, after 4.6 billion years of existence, the sun would get some respect. But the importance of the sun's light has long been ignored as a key factor for human health and well being. Maybe, because incandescent bulbs were cheap and effective for much of the twentieth century, mimicking the light from the sun wasn't a priority. With incandescent bulbs disappearing in favor of the much more versatile LEDs, however, light health is growing...

One of the benefits of LED light bulbs sometimes touted by the media and by manufacturers alike is "no heat." If the heat being referred to is radiant, meaning it heats objects but not the air in between, the claim is accurate. Put your hand a few inches away from a standard 60 watt incandescent bulb and you will feel heat. That is radiant heat from a hot tungsten filament, the source of the light....