Category: Top » Business » Small-business »

Design Parking Lot Lighting With Photometrics

Distributing light and containing it within property boundaries are essential components to remaining in compliance with regulatory codes pertaining to dark skies and energy efficiency.

The size and layout of the parking lot will often help the design team quickly pinpoint the degree of cutoff and optics type most effective for your project. If a parking lot is asymmetrical and located in a nefarious part of town, the need for security may require you to establish a bright perimeter of light that is focused on the edges and corners of the lot and simultaneously contained within the property line. Light spillage can simultaneously be avoided if you use the correct reflectors and glare shields.

Think ahead when designing your parking lot lighting layout. It is only a matter of time before every community in the United States will have some type of light pollution or dark sky law in place.

Outdated fixtures have to be replaced if at all possible with parking lot lights designed specifically for energy efficiency. Our economy could stabilize tomorrow and the market may begin to revive. This is not likely, but possible. Even in such a golden scenario, however, energy efficiency will still remain a top concern in outdoor lighting design.

Parking lot luminaires consume a great deal of power, and power is often produced by burning fossil fuels. Energy efficient technology has been created not just to save people money, but just as importantly, to help protect the environment.

New, energy efficient lighting plays a vital role in reducing the consumption of fossil fuels. Whenever possible, then, ask about new types of lamps like emerging commercial LED lights and pulse-start metal halides. If applicable to your project, the upfront cost will be paid back to your client by lower electric bills and reduced maintenance and disposal fees.

Pole height restrictions can sometimes throw a veritable monkey wrench into an otherwise perfect parking lot lighting design. Pole heights are sometimes determined for you by wind zone laws that limit poles to a certain maximum height. You may be half way through designing a new parking lot lighting layout when you realize that the poles you want to use cannot legally be installed.

In such an instance you may then be inclined to use more poles and more fixtures than you really want to in order to get the foot candle plot that the facility requires for optimal safety and visibility. A better alternative, however, would be to call a lighting design expert who can help you develop a new layout that will combine multiple factors into a more robust and efficient outcome for your client.

A photometric analysis will allow you to develop more than one design option for the parking lot that address all of these concerns with multiple options. Simple raw data can be input into a lighting design software platform known as AGi32. This 3-D rendering software will show different combinations of wattage, new energy saving equipment engineering, multiple options in optics type, and the appropriate cutoff design for the luminaire housing.

Overcoming lighting regulatory codes and pole height restrictions is much easier when you are given more than one solution to propose to your client. Cost effectiveness can be passed on as a value by choosing the fixture designs, unique mounting options, and specific angles of lighting incidence that will most appropriately address the needs of your client within the boundaries of their budget.

Seed Newsvine

Rating: Not yet rated --Choose-- 0 1 2 3 4 5

Comments

No comments posted.

Add Comment

Your Name:


Your Email:


Comment

Enter the code shown

Popular Articles in this cathegory

1: Small Business Taxes: 2009 Tax Season Filing Checklist
2: Top 10 New Year's Resolutions For Failing Businesses Facing Corporation Bankruptcy
3: Adding Entertainment to Any Marketing Message
4: Business Tax Deductions: How to Deduct Expenses Without Keeping Receipts
5: Home Rebate Processing Jobs - Where To Find Them