Lighting Fixtures Costing You Too Much? If you have the sneaking suspicion that you’re wasting money on your business’s utility bills but you’re not sure where you’re wasting it, don’t forget to consider your lighting. Energy efficiency — and the cost savings it brings with it — is a prime reason many business owners in the St. Louis area contact Starbeam Lighting Solutions for a lighting retrofit. How might your business benefit?
Energy Use
Most of us are familiar with fluorescent lights, halogens, vapor lights, and HID lights, as well as the metal halide lights that are common in many commercial and industrial settings. While each is more efficient than incandescent lights, they can still be wasteful.
You can literally feel the waste in the form of the heat given off by these fixtures. While the installation of fluorescent or induction lighting can cut energy consumption by as much as half, but there’s another solution that cuts energy use further still: LED lighting.
Here’s a real-world example drawn from our own inventory. Our HazbayLED lights from RAB lighting come in both 78 watt and 104 watt variants. The former replaces the traditional 250W metal halide lamp, while the the latter replaces a 320W lamp. You’re using a third of the electricity, which adds up to quite a savings when you’re lighting a large area.
There’s an added perk to LEDs: long service life. With a typical lifespan of about 100,000 hours, you’re spending less money on replacements and less man-hours on maintenance.
Location Matters
Where and how your lights are installed makes as much of a difference as the type of lighting. Not all areas need the same type or degree of lighting. For some applications, task lighting that’s closer to the worker and the work they’re completing makes more sense than trying to light an entire area with high bay lighting. Task lighting is often more precise, and has the added benefit of being able to be shut off when not in use, saving both energy and money.
Get Smart About Your Lighting
There’s a lot being written lately about smart homes. Smart businesses use smarter lighting. Use light sensors so that areas are only lit when they’re in use. Use timers and motion detection for off-hours lighting so you’re not wasting electricity when the building is unoccupied. Treat your building as a series of interconnected systems, of which your lighting is just one part.
Other Benefits of LED Lighting
Different businesses have different lighting needs. If you’re lighting a warehouse, safety issues come into play. If, on the other hand, you’re lighting a showroom or clothing store, you’re concerned with more than just light output. Color accuracy also matters, and the higher CRI (Color Rendition Index) of most LED light fixtures proves their worth in a variety of settings.
But How Do I Know…?
If you’re a business owner keeping an eye on your bottom line, your next logical question is likely to be, “How do I know whether this will save me money? And if it does, how do I know it will be enough to offset the cost?”
Good question. The pros at Starbeam Lighting Solutions don’t have to guess at the answer. We’ll perform a lighting audit that will evaluate the energy use of your current system and compare that against the cost of a retrofit. We’ll also give you useful information on how you can make your lighting work better so your employees can work smarter.
To get your lighting audit, answers to your commercial lighting questions, or help finding efficient commercial lighting products contact us at 314-997-0077 today.
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