Lighting Efficiency Improvement

Lighting, of course, is an extremely 'visible' consumer of energy. Almost two-thirds of the lighting points are fitted along with incandescent lamps (ordinary bulbs). The fluorescent lamps of 40W/36W rating and 20W/18W rating (generally called as tube lights) have gained considerable consumer acceptance and are reasonably priced. Compact and little tube fluorescent lamps and electronic dimmable ballasts are now sufficiently reliable sources of lighting. These are slowly gaining acceptance and taking the market over from conventional incandescent and fluorescent lamps.

The lighting industry has already put a lot of effort within systems in which produce substantial energy savings. The lighting equipment used presently consumes only one fourth of the energy in which a typical lighting system of the seventies did, thanks to a clear progress in lamp, ballast and reflector design. New lamp technologies like as sulphur lamps and induction lamps are under development. Therefore, the best lighting technology is still less than 20 percent efficient in turning electricity into light.  So there is a lot of scope for improvement. Table elaborates the energy savings through the use of CFLs.

                                                      Table: Energy Savings Through the Use of CFLs

Use of lighting controls and lighting management promise to lower electricity use through providing light only while it is required and making maximum use of natural light. One of the easiest ways to conserve energy is to turn lighting systems off in unoccupied areas. Thus, accomplishing this task could sometimes be a challenge. Building lighting could be controlled by several methods, from easy (local switches, occupancy sensors, photocells and time clocks) to more elaborate computerized lighting control systems that could be tied in with automatic building mechanical and security system controls.

For save even more energy, without endangering lighting quality, we could use further control techniques, like as daylight-dependent regulation. Electronic sensors, time clocks, computerized lighting control systems or the building's mechanical control systems could be used to control the lighting on and off periods depending on the time of the day. The use of such automatic controls takes away the responsibility of the occupant to control the lighting and assures a perfect adaptation to the exact situation in each work place. There are simply adjustable sensors that could be used to set the light level individually, according to each user's wishes or the room geometry.