Page 19 - College Planning & Management, April/May 2019
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Facilities CAMPUS SPACES
ARCHITECT: DEMONICA-KEMPER ARCHITECTS / PHOTOS © JAMES STEINKAMP PHOTOGRAPHY
Lighting for Humans
How the latest lighting technologies enhance student success, safety, and engagement.
BY AMY MILSHTEIN
THE ADVENT and adoption of LED lighting revolutionized how designers illuminate indoor and outdoor spaces. The technology entered the market in the early aughts touting two great benefits: they use less energy and last much longer than incandescent or fluorescent bulbs. But there was a downside. LEDs were expensive and early iterations had variable quality and reliability.
Over time, the price point has
gone down while quality improves. Today’s LEDs are also color tunable
and fully controllable, allowing more personalization and better energy savings than ever before. “LED technologies are increasingly capable of delivering just the right light, at just the right time, says Bill Marushak, CSP, national sales manager for College and University Programs, Lutron Electronics Co., Inc.
LEDs have even fostered the concept of
Human Centric Lighting, a design trend that leverages the technology’s benefits to create the most comfortable, flexible, and productive spaces. “Human-centric implies that we’re designing light to really enhance health, well-being, and productivity,” according to Vivian Loftness, professor of architecture, Carnegie Mellon University.
Even with all of its benefits LEDs are not universally found on college campuses. “Consider that over 55 percent of existing campus buildings have not been renovated in more than 25 years,” according to
Marushak, who quotes State of Facilities in Higher Educations: 2016 Benchmarks, Best Practices, & Trends. “That means fluorescent lighting is still prominent in a majority of campus buildings.”
Those renovations are coming. And they will undoubtedly bring LEDs into the lighting mix. Here’s some examples of how this technology can be used in the learning environment.
Human Centric Lighting: A Primer
Human Centric Lighting (HCL) is a lighting system that focuses on the end user. The concept has four key aspects, according to Brent Protzman, director of building science and standards development, Lutron.
1. Access to daylight: Natural light and access to views are something we all crave. “Views used to be stigmatized as a distraction,” says Protzman. “But that
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