Brown outs
Singapore, 13th March 2010
In the developed world we are so used to having constant power supply at our fingertips that for many it is not easy to understand the concept of power shortage. In this part of the world (Asia) there are still many areas that struggle with power supply. This morning I read in the newspaper about the power shortage problems in the Philippines for instance. Power cuts of up to 12 hours a day are being reported due to the shortage.
Having been in the Philippines on several occasions I am familiar with the so called “brown” outs. We all know the expression “black out”, where there is simply no power, but I suspect the Philippines have to be one of the inventors of the so called “brown” outs. A “brown out” is when the power just simply drops for a while. I vividly remember, lecturing at the Quezon University when power would just suddenly drop or stop. Presenting in a room with no air-conditioning in the tropics is no joke, so I had prepared myself with a small battery driven mini fan, as the show of course must go on, overhead projection or not.
On another occasion in Indonesia we got complaints from site that lights were either not working or very weak in performance. So first port of call is the the lighting consultant! Of course we have done nothing wrong 🙂 , so the first finger points to the supplier…must be something wrong with the light fitting. But if that is not the case, the next finger points to the installation contractor … there must be some installation issue. Suspicious we finally started measuring the power supply only to find out that the power supply on site was less than 190V (instead of the 230V supposedly).
So while we take power often for granted we should take a moment to reflect on the fact that we are lucky and that power is not always that readily available elsewhere in the world. This should be a strong motivation to relentlessly strive to conserve our energy resources when we design our lighting.
Lighting at the dentist
Singapore, 12th March 2010
Now for something completely different… as a famous person once said 🙂
Today I went to dentist (guess we all have to go there once in a while…don’t worry will not bother you with the details) and would you believe they stuffed LED lighting in my mouth! To be exact 480 nm of blue light LED! No I did not get an LED implant, but one of my fillings had to be replaced and in order for the filling material to harden and set they use blue light LED of the same wavelength as the material they use nowadays for the fillings. Even at the dentist you can’t escape LED anymore… help!
Of course when you lie down you have plenty of time to observe the room around you while instruments are buzzing in your mouth. Besides the LCD screen in front of me that was trying to distract my mind by showing beautiful travel programs, there was the highly focused, non-glaring specialist spot light shining straight into my mouth. That is still good old halogen technology…but for how long still? You kind of expect the dentist to have a LED miners head light on…
The general lighting is still done with near historic fluorescent ceiling lights, its opaque louvers and cheap looking tubes quite a contrast to the highly sophisticated dentist equipment! There would be a great scope for developing a more “dentist” friendly general lighting, somewhere indirect, possibly with dynamic shades of colors to match the ambiance of the travel program you are watching. At least if you watch the Greek Island of Santorini have some matching sky color lighting on the ceiling! 🙂
Who decides what?
Singapore, 11th March 2010
Lighting designers are not the lead consultants, at least not in the majority of the projects, they are part of a much greater project team. I am speaking with my hat of architectural lighting designer on.
The thought for today was triggered by this morning’s meeting where I found out that the “big boss” had totally different ideas of what the lighting was supposed to do than the project director we had been dealing with so far. It was our first presentation of the lighting concept to the board of management. In the lead up we had been closely coordinating our lighting concept with the client’s project director and the lead architect. Understandably we were taken aback. Who is in charge here? Who decides what? Does anybody know what they want?
My point is this: while we need a brief from the client or, if not available, develop a brief and design direction with the client, we need to understand who the key decision makers are. We may love our own lighting concept, the architect may love our concept but if the key stakeholders are not on the same page with you, we may be wasting our time. Of course one can argue that it is up to me to get my client excited about my concept and convince them that “this is it”! But sometimes we are genuinely not on the same page.
I am not the type of lighting designer that says to the client: “it is my way or the high way”, I am a designer hired to expertly create design concepts that works for my client, not just for me. But as we work as part of a team for a client that includes sometimes multiple stakeholders it is not always easy to figure out who decides what!
Back door lighting supplies
Singapore, 10th March 2010
One of our toughest assignments as lighting designers is to make sure the light fittings that are installed are actually what we originally had planned and specified. I am saying this because while we are talking with the client about our specifications, the site contractor is meanwhile negotiating through the back door with his “friends” to buy what he feels is an acceptable “equivalent”. Needles to say his assessment is mostly tainted by his drive to make money, so for him if it roughly looks the same (and at half the price) from “as specified” he will go for it. It will not be the first time I am shown an as specified sample but on checking the installed fitting find it is a local copy. Of course there are projects where we are well in control but I am generalizing what happens often in the Asian (and probably other) markets, as the problem is real.
It all starts with the light fitting specifications. As it is impossible for us to be aware of all light fittings and lighting solutions that exists (new products are continuously developed) we do need to be open minded about alternative proposals as long as it complies or improves on our specifications. At least that is my approach. The tighter the spec however, the less there is room for different and/or alternative interpretations. There are so many quality details and performance parameters that can and should be specified (but which are often taken for granted)… 🙂
It is particularly important to engage the client and procurement manager. Often they have no awareness of what makes the quality of a product and once they understand and adopt the “quality” thinking it becomes much easier to have our design installed as per specification!
Lighting with translucent materials
Singapore, 9th March 2010
Lighting does not exist without its environment, the architectural envelope that defines our field of view. Most of the time, we design lighting with solid reflective materials in mind. From matt surfaces to glossy surfaces and from white to black via the whole color spectrum. It is important for us to understand the nature of these materials in respect to its reaction to incident light and how the reflected light will subsequently be dispersed back into the surrounding space.
Translucent materials are a different kettle of fish. Thought they still reflect light to a certain degree, their main characteristic is that they let light through or allow you to see “through” the material. I am talking about glass, acrylic or alabaster type of materials, but also perforated materials and textiles such as scrim curtains, canvas, etc. I think that as lighting designer we can use these materials to our advantage as tools in our lighting designs. It allows us to create different and sometimes unexpected lighting effects and moods.
An interesting phenomenon with these materials is that when you light it from or in the front (as seen from your observer position) the material reflects light creating a visual barrier in space. However when you light it from or in the back the illumination allows you to see “through” the object material. For instance, in order for you to see inside a shop window, the lighting levels inside needs to be brighter then outside. We all know the window reflections when the sun shines outside…Likewise at night if we want to see outside into the garden, we can only see if outside has brighter lighting levels then inside otherwise the only thing we see is our own reflection in the window… 🙂
One of the latest trends is to use one way mirror materials. For example TV screens located behind such mirrors cannot be seen until they are switched on to miraculously appear behind the mirror.
Lighting and terrorism
Singapore, 8th March 2010
With the “Hurt Locker” movie about the heroics of a bomb squad in Iraq sweeping a number of awards at the Oscars today it seems to be an appropriate subject for today’s blog! In my early days of being a lighting designer terrorism was not really something we worried about. Yes, we would avoid going to “war zones” like Israel and Libanon or areas like former Yougoslavia, but airplane high jacking was not really a threat. In our earlier days of flying we would often go visit the pilot in the cockpit…remember? But some Al Qaida and 9-11’s later, how the world has changed…
I don’t know about my colleagues, but we have now added a travel alert clause in our consultancy contracts to cover against travelling to areas that have been designated by official government announcements as unsafe to travel. Sad to say that we already had to use to it…
It has also impacted on the actual lighting design as most projects like important public and corporate buildings, hotels, etc, nowadays specifically require lighting for security and bomb checking on arrival. Something unheard of not even 10 years ago. In a design coordination meeting today I was further confronted with it as we discussed the architect’s drawings for a public building showing possible bomb attack and impact zones. You may not believe this, but it had an actual “impact” on the day lighting design of the building! As a result the planned day lighting intake had to be compromised for possible terrorist bomb attacks!
If things continue this way we may soon find ourselves designing architectural lighting with explosion proof luminaires!
Made in China
Australia- Singapore, 7th March 2010
Travelled back to Singapore today… as usual time for some reflection, catching up on some news and work during the flight. There is a big debate going on in Australia about the difference between a product Made in Australia or a Product of Australia. In the first case all components and ingredients are from Australian soil, in the second case packaging, assembling or manufacturing are done in Australia but components and ingredients may well be imported from overseas. In order to support the local economy, origin and ownership (“Australian owned”) are all used in marketing in the same spirit as people are urged to buy “natural, organic or green” products. Where am I going with this?
In lighting we have the same thing happening. “Made in China” is sort of synonymous for fixtures that are cheap and locally made or even copied. Country of origin over the years has always had a quality label attached to it. China, Taiwan, Korea versus Germany, Italy or France in Europe, etc. I remember that in my Philips days clients would insist to have “made in Holland” lamps rather than Philips lamps “made in Thailand” for instance. Of course it is just a sticker or printed or screened label on the product… 🙂
The point is that more and more “Made in China” does not necessarily mean a bad quality anymore, on the contrary. Many of the top European lighting manufacturers have set up manufacturing facilities in China, some already for many years. I have visit several of them and the majority of the plants operate with imported machinery and are quality tested according to European standards. Even paint powders and spray machines are from Europe. In fact most of the products that are “Made in China” are exported back to Europe… some not necessarily carrying the “made in China” sticker!
“Product of Germany” still somehow sounds better than “Made in China”. But reversely “Made in China” now is becoming much more attractive (or should I say acceptable) to most developers than “Product of Germany”!
Solar economics
Australia, 6th March 2010
Considering solar energy as a possible source of energy for lighting is more and more part of our conceptual thinking process. It can be our own initiative, the clients initiative, or just due diligence. In this case the client and architect want us to investigate the economics of applying solar energy as part of the building’s roof design.
We approached a few reputable “solar” companies to obtain some “facts and figures” on applying solar panels. We got a reply back today from one of them indicating a pay-back period of no less than 27 years! Even for the hardened supporters of solar energy this seems a bit too long! The information did not state the lifespan of the panels but from previous experience it is highly unlikely that its lifespan will outperform the payback time. In other words the solar panel will most likely have to be replaced well before its payback time has been reached.
Because we can’t rely on good solar weather every single day, the design needs to be “over designed” to cater for those “non-solar” days. According to general practice the installation should be designed to cater for 3 non-solar days or alternatively for an average of only 3 hours sun per day. However by connecting the solar installation to the power grid we can back up energy short comings any time. It has the added advantage that the solar power collected does not have to be stored and over production can be fed back into the grid, which saves on the relatively expensive costs of the storage units.
Right now it looks like the economics of solar energy are still a hard sell, but with the system costs reducing, efficiency and life span still improving together with decreasing lighting power needs, solar will undoubtedly reach acceptable pay back times in the near future.
Architectural laser lighting
Australia, 5th March 2010
Right now LED lighting is the trend in practically every architectural lighting application. Interiors, exteriors, landscape lighting, you name it LED will be one of the first lighting systems mentioned as prospective choice. But what about other lighting systems?
Recently in our projects we have been investigating the possibility to use laser light as an alternative to floodlighting. These are conceptual thoughts still but the more we study the more it seems a viable and exciting option. While I can’t really tell you the concepts for obvious confidentiality reasons :), I thought it would be nice to share a little bit. Maybe some of you have already had some really good experiences with it.
Most of the laser lighting I see when “googling” around are in the entertainment or projection applications, mostly beam projections in the sky or image projections on building surfaces. What interests me particularly is not so much the multi colored laser beams but the white laser. It looks pure and has a much more architectural feel. Because of the nature of laser it seems we can place the “light box” that creates the laser beams in simple and singe locations, reducing the need for multiple lighting point installations. Add to that the relatively low energy consumption per m2 of building area covered and we have another potentially strong energy saving point.
On the downside, laser is associated with potential danger because of its highly concentrated beam properties. Operating professional laser systems requires a technical license in most countries and may even require a clearance from civil aviation authorities. There may other negative issues related to laser but despite all that I believe that we may well see more and more laser applications in the architectural lighting domain.
The economics of dimming
Australia, 4th March 2010
Today I would like to highlight the importance of applying dimming control systems in our projects. We often focus on energy saving purely from the point of view of the actual light source itself when we compare halogen lighting to equivalent LED lighting for instance and then calculate the return on investment to justify the difference in capital costs. Generally professional clients such as hotel operators and developers will consider the extra investment if it is recovered inside 2-3 years, some even accepting 5 years.
With even more pressure now put on lighting designers to further reduce the energy consumption (and related carbon emissions…) we find ourselves studying further ways to do so and dimming control is definitely one of them. In summary, the more you use dimming control systems the more energy can potentially be saved and the shorter the return on investment. Considering that dimming installations can be quite costly (like U$ 50 to 100,000 for a decent size/star hotel), showing the client that the additional investment can pay off sooner rather then later is very important to get the client on our side.
Dimming helps in several ways. We can adapt artificial lighting levels to daylight situations and we can program lights to be off when not needed. A study by Lutron showed that dimming lighting levels by 20% can already achieve a return on investment within 2-3 year. Increasing dimming levels further and switching of lights were not required will improve these figures even further.
With our focus turning more and more towards reducing the environmental impact of lighting, dimming and managed lighting control will more and more become an important and integral part of our lighting design considerations in time to come.
PS: I would like to acknowledge Lutron for providing some “facts and figures” on the economics of dimming.
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