Fixture Cost Frustration

One of my clients has expressed frustration with the caveats I place at the end of my lighting fixture budget. Why can’t I give the client a simple budget estimate? The answer is that fixture manufacturers don’t have a manufacturer’s suggested retail price (MSRP) for their products, which is something we’ve all come to expect for products ranging from potato chips to cars. We all know that things we want to buy have an MSRP or list price and it’s up to the seller to decide whether or not to sell at a lower price.

However, with lighting equipment the sales representative and the manufacturer collaborate to establish pricing for each project (see chapter 9). Larger projects with more luminaires will usually pay less per luminaire. This can be frustrating for everyone. It’s hard to develop a reliable fixture cost database when fixture costs are variable.

Another issue with pricing from the sales rep is that it is usually dealer net, distributor net, or DN pricing. This means that the luminaire price the sales rep gives to the designer is the price that the electrical distributor will pay the manufacturer. It does not include the electrical distributor’s markup for overhead and profit, nor does it include possible markups by the electrical contractor and/or the general contractor.   It is up to the lighting designer to estimate the total markup(s) as well as taxes, shipping and such, and add that amount to the projected lighting fixture budget, but designers have no direct knowledge of what markup these firms will add, nor do we have any control over their markups. The result is that I wind up footnoting my budget with notes like markup percentages are estimated, pricing is based on cost estimates provided by sales representative, and pricing is based on projects of similar size and scope.

Finally, as I explained here, the fixtures that I specify may not be purchased for the project. Once substitutions enter the picture another layer of mystery is added. Yes, it’s complicated. Here’s a flow chart that tries to explain the flow of information (denoted by question marks) and money (denoted by dollar signs) of design and sales relationships. See chapter 9 for a full explanation.

fixture sales

 

Dimming That Doesn’t Dim Off

Recently a designer specified 0-10V dimming for a series of LED downlights.  The electrician powered the LEDs by connecting them to a nearby breaker panel.  The 0-10V control signal was generated by the lighting control system.  This was a simple system that should have worked with no problems.  Much to everyone’s surprise the lights would dim but they wouldn’t go off!  What happened?

Dimming light sources other than incandescent is a technical challenge.  It requires the ballast (for fluorescent, HID, cold cathode, etc.) or the driver (for LEDs) to precisely control the amperage and the voltage, and may also require converting the incoming AC to a DC output (for some LEDs).  This is difficult for fluorescent and HID lamps because the electricity must arc from one side of the lamp to the other, and at low power levels that arc simply fails.  Dimming LEDs often results in a visibly jittery dimming curve as well as a jump to zero when dimming down and a jump to on when dimming up. (This article in Electrical Construction & Maintenance is a good overview of the problems with dimming LEDs.)

In architectural lighting, however, the inability to dim all the way to zero is usually not seen as a problem.  Typical dimming applications such as classrooms and meeting rooms may want to dim lights for a presentation, but some light is still desirable so that attendees can see each other for discussion and see their desktop to take notes. Dimming is acceptable as long as the dimming is smooth down to a minimum light level.  In these installations the drop from, say, ten percent to zero isn’t an issue because it doesn’t happen until the room is empty and the lights are turned completely off.

With 0-10V dimming, though, the dimmer or driver is powered by the incoming line voltage, so its always operating.  As a result, its minimum operating capacity is also the fully dimmed state.  A 100-10% ballast or driver, for example, has a minimum output of 10% not zero.  When the fader is at the bottom of its travel we would normally expect the lights to go off, but they only go to 10%.  Here’s a graph showing the performance of representative LED fixtures dimmed with a 0-10V dimmer.

Source: U.S. DOE
Source: U.S. DOE

The solution is to provide separate switching of the line voltage delivered to the fixture.  Most wallbox dimmers have a toggle switch below the fader so that the fixture can be shut off at any time.    Here’s a schematic of a simple circuit.

Source: U.S. DOE
Source: U.S. DOE

Other solutions come from other dimming techniques, including three-wire and four-wire dimming where the line voltage and the control signal come out of the same device.  This guarantees that at a minimum state power to the fixture is shut off.  Other control protocols, notably DMX512, and the electronics that utilize them can usually dim to zero.

Light and Health

The DOE has recently published a fact sheet titled Lighting for Health: LEDs in the New Age of Illumination.   It summarizes the Trends in Neuroscience January 2014 article Measuring and Using Light in the Melanopsin Age.  Both publications explain the current understanding of our visual and nonvisual response to light.

The basics of our visual response to light is understood by everyone – it gives us the ability to see.  The nonvisual response is less known generally, and is still being researched by scientists across the globe.  This is discussed in my book in Chapter 16 Light and Health.  What we have learned in the past two decades is that there is a third type of light sensitive cell in our eyes (the first two being rods and cones) called the intrinsically photosensitive retinal ganglion cell (ipRGC).  When light strikes the ipRGC a pigment called melanopsin breaks down, sending a signal to the brain.  That signal doesn’t go to the visual cortex, however, but to the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) the body’s timekeeper.  The SCN regulates circadian rhythms and the production of hormones affecting alertness, heart rate, blood pressure, stress response, and more.  The SCN is reset by information from the ipRGCs.  Simple exposure to light, though, is not enough. The exposure time of day, duration, and wavelengths all contribute to proper synchronization. SCN regulation seems to be maintained by high brightness, short wavelength light in the morning (i.e., morning daylight). If appropriate stimulation does not occur, the timing signals for hormone production can become desynchronized. It is known that circadian desynchronization plays a roll in insomnia, mood, depression, reaction time, creativity, and alertness. It is suspected that this desynchronization also plays a roll in cancer, diabetes, dementia, and cardiovascular disease.

This has lead to some talk of light as a drug that controls the SCN.  At this point it is probably premature to attempt to apply this information in most lighting designs because most spaces have a wide range of users with a similarly wide range of needs.  A lighting design for the overnight shift, for example, may not work well for the day shift.  There are a few rules of thumb that can be applied in specific circumstances.  For example, a designer can minimize the nonvisual circadian response by limiting the amount of light, especially short wavelength light, reaching the eye.  However, the science is still in the early days and the specifics about the effect of light level, spectral distribution, and timing on users and for various applications are not clear.

New LED Performance Measurements

The Illuminating Engineering Society (IES) has published two new documents related to measuring the performance of Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs).  The titles, as well as the aspects that are included and excluded, reveal the complexity of LEDs.

The basic problem is that LEDs typically do not fail the way other lamps do.  Instead of a failure that results in the end of light output, LED output fades over time.  The result is that at some point, although the LED is still producing light, it is no longer producing enough light for the application so we would say that it has reached the end of its useful life.  LEDs have very long lives and relatively short development cycles so it is entirely possible that by the time testing of an LED is complete a newer product has already replaced it.  This is compounded by the sensitivity LEDs have to temperature, voltage, and other factors that can mean lab measurements differ greatly from real world measurements.  This gives rise to the need for clearly defined testing procedures that reproduce conditions found in typical installations so that designers can rely on the information from the manufacturers.

The first document is LM-84-14 IES Approved Method for Measuring Luminous Flux and Color Maintenance of LED Lamps, Light Engines, and Luminaires.  (In the IES naming system LM stands for lumen maintenance, 84 is the document number, and 14 is the year it was issued or updated.)  It describes the procedures to be followed in obtaining luminous flux (light output) and color maintenance measurements under standard operating conditions.  However, it does not provide information on sampling, or extrapolation of the data for longer time frames.

The second document is LM-85-14 IES Approved Method for Electrical and Photometric Measurements of High Power LEDs, which describes the procedures to be followed in performing accurate measurements of light output of white and colored high-power LEDs.  The procedures do not cover LED arrays or modules, AC driven LEDs, among other things.

These two documents join several others that describe the testing and measuring of LEDs. The first is LM-79-08 Approved Method: Photometric Measurements of Solid State Lighting Products, which describes the procedures for testing and reporting of: total flux (light output); color temperature; color rendering index, electrical power characteristics; efficacy (in lumens/watt).  LM-79 requires testing of a complete lighting fixture.  It does not apply to bare LED packages. LM-79 does not measure the distribution, only the total light output.  As a result, it does not provide us with complete photometric performance of the fixture tested.

The next standard is LM-80-08 Approved Method:  Measuring Lumen Maintenance of LED Light Sources, which is intended to measure only the LED package, not a complete fixture.  LM-80 does not define the end of life for an LED package.  It is simply  method for determining the light output degradation.  LM-80 outlines the testing conditions and the measurement methods that are to be used to measure, track and report the lumen maintenance of an LED package over the course of 6,000 hours.  it does not provide a means of estimating life expectancy or light output beyond 6,000 hours.

TM-21-11 Projecting Long Term Lumen Maintenance of LED Light Sources picks up where LM-80 leaves off. (TM stands for Technical Memorandum)  It recommends a method for projecting the lumen maintenance of LEDs using the data obtained from LM-80 testing.  TM-21 is used to derive L70, which is the number of hours, or life, before the LED package is emitting 70% of the initial lumens.  L70 is the number most frequently used by manufacturers as the life, or the useful life, of their LEDs.

Getting Better Buildings

Henry Petroski, engineer and author, has a piece in today’s New York Times about declining quality in construction materials and workmanship. He places a lot of the blame on “the industries whose practices favor the use of inferior products and labor that drive modern construction: the developers, lenders, builders and Realtors who, to make quick money, have created a stock of domestic and commercial infrastructure that is a waste of resources and will not last. “ I don’t disagree, but based on my professional experience, and on that of many of my friends and colleagues, I think there’s room for more blame that creates a circular firing line.

First in line are owners who want what they want but are unwilling to pay for it. (I have many colleagues who blame Wal-mart and their ilk for this attitude but I’m not an economist and this isn’t about that). I’ve been involved in too many projects where, as the design progresses and is refined, the cost estimates go up but the budget doesn’t. Nor is the developing design reigned in. Rather, the owner assumes, or is assured, that in competitive bidding the cost will somehow come back down to the original, early estimate. Rarely does the architect push back, which introduces the second problem.

Architects are supposed to be the leader of the design team and the advocate for the client. Entering into the bidding phase of a project knowing that the design has exceeded the budget doesn’t help anyone and creates a hostile environment for everyone once the low bid is accepted and construction begins. Which brings us to villain number three: contractors.

Often, especially in publicly funded projects, I have to produce a three name specification, meaning that for every light fixture I have to specify three that I deem to be equal. If I don’t I’m in breach of my contract. Astonishingly, contractors are not required to supply the products that the design team has specified! The result is that contractors are often in a race to the bottom, submitting bids that are unrealistically low because they’ve made assumptions about what kind of substitutions they can make. They do it because they know that their competition is doing it and the low bid wins. Swap out 100 lights that cost $300 for a $100 model and you’ve just underbid your competition. Now, multiply that by hundreds of items in a building and you’re looking at a huge set of conflicts. You can imagine the screaming that results when, later in the project, the designer rejects the substitution.

“I think this is a decent alternative, and it’s what I can afford.” says the contractor.

“This is nothing like the fixture in the specifications. It won’t do the job and I won’t approve it.” replies the designer.

“Well, it’s what I bid.”

“Well then you didn’t bid on this building. What building did you bid on?”

The solution, as I see it, is stricter contracts with builders. I’d love to see the American Institute for Architects (AIA), the International Association of Lighting Designers (IALD), the International Interior Design Association (IIDA), American Society of Interior Designers (ASID) and others work together to draft model bidding instructions and contracts for owners that set clear limits on substitutions. If the contractor can’t substitute inferior materials we’ve made a HUGE difference in the quality of the building.

I’ve worked with plenty of owners, architects, and builders who aren’t as I’ve just described. However, they aren’t the strong majority. Everyone involved can do better. Owners can accept that sometimes you get what you pay for, and that the lowest bid isn’t necessarily the best bid. Architects can take a stronger stand with their clients to prevent issuing drawings for a $10 million building with an $8 million budget. Contractors can construct the building shown in the drawings, not a cheaper alternative. Contractors and unions have no reason to change, and owners don’t have a real organization that can play a role. It’s entirely possible, but I think that the design organizations will have to lead the way.

Now, the Good Climate News

Ok, the headline is slightly misleading. There’s no good news about the fact of climate change, but there is some good news about the politics and the technology for mitigating it. First, the politics where there are several encouraging developments. First, as I’ve previously mentioned, Michael Bloomberg, Henry Paulson, and Tom Steyer have launched an organization called Risky Business that focuses on quantifying and publicizing the economic risks from the impacts of climate change. Politics makes strange bedfellows, and this is an example – people from across the political spectrum and with various perspectives on business and the economy coming together to advocate that we act now to do what we can to slow or stop climate change.

The second piece of news happened at a congressional hearing on June 18th (an archived webcast is available at the link). Four former EPA administrators, all republicans, were called to testify before the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. All four of them agreed that there is no debate on the reality of climate change and that immediate action is needed. Here are a few quotes:

William Ruckelshaus, first EPA administrator in 1970 under President Nixon: “Inherent in [a list of previously cited environmental challenges] was uncertain science and powerful economic interests resisting controls. The same is true of climate change. In all of the cases cited the solutions to the problems did not result in the predicted economic and social calamity. Scientific uncertainty or the inevitable industry resistance does not mean that nothing should be done unless we are willing to suffer the consequences of inaction.”

Lee Thomas, EPA administrator from 1985-1989 under President Reagan: “The issue of climate change is one that the EPA and the global scientific community have studied and analyzed for decades. And since my time as Administrator, the assessment of risk global warming poses to public health and the environment has continually improved and become more certain.”

William Reilly, head of the EPA from 1989-1992 under President George H. W. Bush: “Markets the world over eagerly seek clean energy technologies. … Technology and innovation are a comparative advantage for our country that will help control what we can and help find ways to replace the most serious contributors to the climate challenge. This is an enormous opportunity for U.S. entrepreneurs and exporters even as we deploy more clean energy at home.”

Christine Todd Whitman, EPA head from 2001-2003 under President George W. Bush: “Congressional action and leadership would be a preferable approach. But since Congress has declined to act, the EPA must.”

It’s getting harder and harder for the conservative crowd to deny reality. Sooner, not later, they’re going to have to admit that we face a global challenge. At that point they’ll have to decide if the U.S. is going to lead or follow. Industry and citizens clearly intend to lead. Consider the following:

On the technology front there’s more good news. In Hawaii the adoption of solar power has been so successful that the local power company can’t handle the power being fed into the grid. Beginning in December of 2013 the Hawaiian Electric Company told contractors to stop connecting solar panels to the grid because there’s so much energy that it may be a threat to the system. Until studies can confirm whether grid upgrade are needed, and what they are, solar panels can still be connected to homes and businesses but the excess energy cannot be fed back into the grid.

One solution to the problem is storage of the excess energy until it is needed. A new type of battery that uses vanadium in a solution of sulfuric acid is being developed that quickly charges and discharges with little loss of performance, even after 20,000 cycles. It’s called a vanadium redox flow battery. Read the article. It’s pretty amazing to read how smart people are able to solve whatever challenges are put in front of them.

First, The Bad Climate News

There’s more climate change news this week, some of it good and which I’ll get to in a few days.  First, though, the bad news.  According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) May 2014 was the hottest May ever recorded, and we have records dating back as far as 1880.

  • The combined average temperature over land and ocean surfaces was 1.33°F higher than the 20th century average, and the average temperature over land alone was 2.03°F higher.
  • The period of March through May was the third warmest on record, with global land surface temperature 2.27°F above the 20th century average.
  • he period of January through may was the fifth warmest on record, with a global land surface temperature of 1.19°F above the 20th century average.

Here’s a map showing the global temperature variations for May in degrees Celsius.

201405temps

Combined with the just released report Risky Business, this is indeed bad news.  This report was commissioned by a new organization of the same name that was started by former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, and hedge fund manager Tom Steyer.  The report warns that, among other climate driven issues we’ll face by mid century, the number of days over 95°F will nearly double to between 45 and 96.  Outdoor laborers, including construction workers, may be unable to work for days or weeks at a time because of the extreme threat of heat stroke and even death due to the high heat.

Why do I keep going on about climate change?  Because it’s real, it’s here, and it does and will affect the lighting profession.  As long as we are still struggling to control greenhouse gas emissions to limit climate change we should expect to see it impact lighting designers and manufacturers.  First, we should expect to see expanded requirements for, and limitations on, lighting systems.  Lower lumen power densities (LPDs), more requirements for sensors and controls, and more requirements for load shedding all seem inevitable.  On one hand that may be good for the profession because fewer and fewer architects and interior designers are going to be able to execute their own lighting designs (more work for us!).  On the other hand it will probably be a struggle to get clients to pay us more for the additional work.

The second impact this will have on our profession is that of credentials.  Today, lighting designer credentials are entirely voluntary except for the lead designer on federal projects, who must hold an LC.  I think we can expect more clients to ask for higher levels of green certification for their buildings, whether that is LEED, Green Globes, Energy Star or some other.  To demonstrate that we have the education and training to design these buildings, green credentials are going to be more important in the near future.  Designers who do not hold a LEED Green Associate credential, at a minimum, will be at a disadvantage.  So get ready.  The work, and the rewards, of being a lighting designer are changing.

The Cost of Mitigating Climate Change (It’s Cheap)

Henry Paulson, former Secretary of the Treasury, has on op-ed piece in today’s New York Times in which he looks at the potential costs of climate change from a risk management perspective. His conclusion is that the most conservative thing to do, the thing that will hold down the size of government and our national debt, is to act now to mitigate climate change while the costs are low and we have more time. His solution is a carbon tax, which he predicts will “empower the market to find the most efficient response” and will “create incentives to develop new, cleaner energy technologies.” He makes several comparisons to the risks that were ignored leading up to the economic crash of 2008 and makes a point of urging his fellow republicans to avoid the same mistakes that were made then.

Conservatives reaction to a carbon tax, cap and trade, or any other form of legislation to curb emissions is always to claim that it will be disastrous for industry and the economy. However two recent studies from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce dispute that. As I’ve noted before, the IPCC estimates that the costs of stabilizing CO2 is 0.6% to 1.3% of GDP. Perhaps you distrust the United Nations, so let’s take a look at what the Chamber of Commerce has to say. The chamber commissioned a study that was released in May. Deeply opposed to any form of energy or environmental regulation, they commissioned a report from an organization with similar attitudes – the Energy Institute. Their findings estimate the cost of carbon regulation at $51 billion per year through 2030. Now to you and me that’s a lot of money, but in the $21.5 trillion U.S. economy that comes out to 0.2%. To put that into personal terms, it amounts to about $1.20 per day per household.

I’m not saying that there is no downside. Jobs will be lost in extractive industries like coal and oil. I’ve been unemployed. I know what it’s like to worry about paying rent or buying groceries, and I’d like to see those who lose their jobs get retraining and even subsidized moves so that they can go to where the new jobs are located. But, I don’t think we should smother the planet in CO2 to save jobs that are going to be lost anyway or to hang onto that $1.20 per household. The times they are a-changin’ whether we like it or not. The goal should be to control that change to the benefit of as many people as possible. Acting now makes that easier to do.

DOE Suspends PAR38 L-Prize Competition

On June 13, 2014 the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)  suspended the L-Prize PAR38 Competition. The LED PAR38 products currently on the market fall far short of reaching the rigorous L -rize targets, making it unlikely the DOE will receive a qualifying entry in a reasonable amount of time. The DOE cannot lower the efficacy target because it was set by Congress. The DOE will continue to monitor the PAR38 market for performance and price improvements, to consider reopening the competition at a later date.  The graph below illustrates the market vs the L-Prize goals as of November 2013.

LPrizeNov2013PAR38graph

 

More information is available on the DOE web site.