Case study: Lighting sustainability
Q: Do you know what consumes 1/3 of your electricity?
A: Lighting
If Kiwis all used efficient lighting, New Zealand could reduce its annual energy consumption by the amount of electricity used in Waitakere and North Shore cities for a year, or more than $278 million per year in householders' power bills.
Heating and lighting beams,
Conservation House
So DOC decided to find out what light levels staff were working under. Two lux meters, gadgets which measure lighting levels, on loan from Right House, made their way gradually around the country from office to office.
As a result, surplus-to requirement fluoro tubes were taken out at offices across the country while other offices found that work-friendly light levels could be acheived by simply re-positioning desks. An easy-to-solve problem with a spare anglepoise desklight or two.
In a surprising result, two areas less than two metres apart, varied in light levels, from 1042 to 123 lux. Fortunately, the dark area is where the office's map makers sit and the super light area is where the graphics lady checks her work. In both cases the light levels were work-appropriate.
Note: the lux level standard for New Zealand is 400; in Australia it's 300. The Energy Efficiency and Lighting Authority (ECCA) however, thinks 300 lux is more than sufficient.
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