For some businesses, saving energy may be as easy as changing light bulbs. The U.S. Energy Information says commercial businesses used 19 percent of their electricity, or 262-kilowatt hours, on lighting last year. The cost for commercial lighting hits $38 billion according to the Department of Energy. So, there’s money to be saved by reducing those figures.
“Clark Public Utilities is always looking for ways to help smaller businesses reduce their use of energy,” said Bill Hibbs, commercial lighting manager for the utility. “Switching from existing incandescent lights to florescent or LEDs can offer up to fifty percent savings for them.”
For many boutique retailers, small businesses and apartment complexes, saving money means unscrewing watt-hungry incandescent bulbs and switching to more efficient CFLs or LEDs. Although both are energy savers, LEDs deliver more savings and offer a longer life, up to 50 times incandescent bulbs.
“A phone call to the utility is all it takes for us to get started,” said Hibbs. “After a brief discussion we schedule a visit to the customer’s site.”
On site, Hibbs or one of the utility’s energy services staff members will inspect the site without interrupting the customer’s business and count the number of lights in the building. Back at the office, he runs numbers, looks at incentives available to help ease the transition to more energy saving bulbs and determines if the project pencils out. “Moving to energy saving LEDs costs more,” Hibbs said. “But for many projects utility incentives will cover about half the cost. That plus the energy savings will often move these improvements up in the list of priorities for local businesses.”
Businesses make switch
Recently three smaller organizations swapped out their incandescent bulbs for LEDs. Each had a different need. Kings Way Church needed improved lighting and lower maintenance costs. Cascade Apartments needed improved outside lighting. And Sweet Spot Skirts, with fewer than 30 lights, simply wanted to follow through on its commitment to make the world a better place.
While saving energy and money was desirable, both the church and the skirt manufacturer had concerns that went beyond that. They were worried about color. Sweet Spot wanted a true rendition of the color of its athletic skirts in its retail environment, and the church wanted to be sure the new LEDs didn’t shift the color of its stained glass windows.
“Color rendering depends on both the light striking something and the light reflected from that object,” Hibbs explained. “Sunlight is the best. Artificial lighting tends to shift what we see as color depending upon its Kelvin rating, or the temperature of a light.”
A Kelvin temperature rating of 8,000 is light like you’d find in a hospital. A rating of 3,000 is what you might find in a man-cave or den.
“What worked for the church and Sweet Spot Skirts was about a 4,100 Kelvin rating for their LEDs,” Hibbs said. In all three cases utility staff provided guidance and helped the customer select a color indexing that worked for the business.
“All three of these businesses will recoup up to 50 percent of the conversion cost through our CLIP program, and will continue to save around 70 percent on their lighting bill by shifting to LEDs,” Hibbs said. “And the LEDs should last a couple of decades, which reduces their maintenance costs a lot.”
Energy Adviser is written by Clark Public Utilities. Send questions to ecod@clarkpud.com or to Energy Adviser, c/o Clark Public Utilities, P.O. Box 8900, Vancouver, WA 98668.
