Page 67 - Lighting Magazine April 2019

The Illuminating Engineering Society (IES) Re- silience Commi ee was established to “research and develop best practices for lighting that must absorb, recover from, and more success- fully adapt to adverse events such as storms and earthquakes.”
This commi ee’s work is primarily focused on commercial lighting, however, Terry McGowan, Director of Engineering for the American Light- ing Association (ALA), is participating in the IES Resilience Commi ee and hopes to contribute a section on residential resilient lighting to any future standard developed by the IES commi ee.
McGowan points out, “It’s important to note that resilient lighting is di erent than emergency lighting.” Emergency lighting typically must oper- ate for 90 minutes a er a power outage to enable building occupants to leave the building safely. Resilient lighting, on the other hand, enables people to remain in the building – in some cases to shelter in place – and continue to operate for days or even weeks a er a disaster/power outage.
RP-11 Lighting for Interior and Exterior Residen- tial Environments – which was jointly produced by the ALA and IES – is an ANSI-approved, recom- mended practice guide for designing and teaching lighting. RP-11 has a section that de nes and dis- cusses resilient lighting as a design consideration.
Additional organizations are promoting resil- iency at the building level, including:
< National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)
< Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)
< National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS)
< American Institute of Architects (AIA)
< International Code Council (ICC)
< National Fire Protection Association (NFPA)
< US Green Building Council (USGBC) RELi Rating System
Perhaps the most important thing to know about resilient lighting is that it does not yet exist. There are currently no products in the commercial or residential markets being promoted as resilient lighting, and the IES Resilience Commi ee has not yet published any standard.
cousins of resilienT liGHTinG
In residential lighting, there are at least ve trends that are inching the industry closer toward resil- ient lighting, almost by accident. They are:
1. RECHARGEABLE OUTDOOR LED LANTERNS
Some of these portable lanterns have built-in USB ports to charge mobile devices and Bluetooth speakers. The primary motivation for these products is outdoor fun, rather than disaster preparation, but the trend is catching on and gives a glimpse into what residential resilient lighting could look like.
At January Lightovation, portable outdoor lanterns were shown by Kichler, Access Lighting, Koncept, and others. Some of these fun outdoor lanterns are designed to run for 8 to 10 hours on a full charge.
Kichler o ers a decora- tive series
of portable LED outdoor lanterns with Bluetooth® speakers that can last up to 6 hours on a single charge.
2. RESIDENTIALEMERGENCYLIGHTINGFORBUILDINGEGRESS
Progress Lighting has introduced one of the rst residential emergency light lines with its Waystar emergency downlights. The product is designed to operate 90 minutes, which is not long enough to technically be called “resilient,” but represents the beginning of residential lighting products intended for emergencies.
The Waystar line of emergency lighting from Progress.
resilient lightiNg
april 2019 | enLIGHTenment Magazine 63