“Just buy a bunch of light bulbs and get someone to install them”, this was my first experience with lighting retrofits. This was also my first experience with the complexity of lighting choices, lighting design and complaints from the end users.
Fifty buildings and 100 cases of CFL lamps later, what did I learn? Success is in the details, upfront planning, experience, energy and economic analysis and that there is more to a successful lighting retrofit than installing new lamps in the existing fixtures. At the end of the day a successful energy retrofit is measured by the occupant’s comfort, the energy saved and the reduction in maintenance costs associated with the new lighting system that you have provided.
Regardless of how much energy your lighting design saves, unhappy end users and maintenance personnel can unravel that entire savings as fast as you install it. What have I seen? I have seen the new energy saving CFL lamps yanked back out and incandescent lamps put back in, the new lights that I specified turned off to make way for high wattage halogen task lamps on every desk, often from their own home, and the maintenance department replacing the new hi-lumen fluorescent lamps with whatever was in there hidden stockpile or was a better bargain.
So what makes a successful lighting retrofit? They included coordination with the end users, building owners and maintenance personnel and provide the right amount of lighting where it was needed with a mix of economical lighting technologies tailored to each applications needs and often times utilizing the latest modeling software to develop new lighting layouts with retrofit kits or new fixtures. They also included a realistic and conservative approach to energy/ economic analysis in conjunction with specifications and construction documents tailored to the projects existing conditions and specific scope.