Cardinia Shire Council's lighting upgrade

Victoria’s Cardinia Shire Council engaged Energy Makeovers to upgrade the lighting at its Cultural Centre and Beaconsfield Community Centre to LED technology. The upgrade was part of the council’s energy efficiency and climate change management plan.

It involved replacing fluorescent tubes, halogen down-lights, shop lights, metal halide floodlights, car park lights, and compact fluorescent down-lights with a range of LED lights, and energy control sensors.  The installation followed the success of earlier projects at the council’s Life Complex and the Cockatoo Sports Stadium.

A lighting upgrade for Cardinia Shire Council

Cardinia Shire Council measured energy demand at both new centre before and after the LED lighting upgrade (approximately a year apart) to allow for any seasonal variations.  Here are the results: they show a dramatic reduction in energy consumption consistent with the design calculations made by Energy Makeovers.

The lower graph shows the results at Cardinia Cultural Centre, which included the installation of a solar PV system concurrent with the LED lighting upgrade.

LED lamps produce the same amount of light output as other lighting technologies but at significantly lower power consumption.   According to Energy Makeovers’ Commercial Lighting Project Manager Bruce Page, “We can now provide a full range of high-quality LED lighting for lighting applications, and the results are significant improvements to our customers’ energy bills and greenhouse gas footprints.”

How did a LED lighting upgrade affect Cardinia Shire Council

Although the investment in LED lighting has a very short payback period based on energy savings alone, customers often have other motivations for upgrading to LED lights:

• eliminating the time and effort required to replace blown lamps. This can also become very costly if electricians and scissor lift equipment is required in commercial buildings (and potentially dangerous is stepladders are deployed in homes)
• reducing carbon footprints, often aligned with corporate emissions reduction targets
• eliminating fire risks, hightened by inefficient lighting running hot enough to ignite debris in ceiling spaces.