3.7 Energy-Saving Lighting
3.7.1 Energy-Saving Lighting
The invention of the incandescent bulb over a century ago by Edison (in 1879) and the consequent introduction of electrical lighting have meant a huge change in people's life. It not only provides safe illumination, as there is no more open fire of the candles and gas lighting, but also provides an increased convenience, as it can be switched on by a wall switch instead of lighting each individual light point. With the use of electric light, electricity is consumed. With high penetration rates for both indoor and outdoor applications, this consumption has become very considerable. For example, according to the Next Generation Lighting Industry Alliance (NGLIA), lighting accounts for approximately 20% of current North American electricity consumption. Consequently, there has been an ongoing attempt to reduce power consumption for decades.
The attempt for energy reduction started to gain momentum with the higher penetration of electrified light after the Second World War, with fluorescent sources replacing incandescent sources. For higher power ranges, metal halide sources have taken up market share in street lighting and outdoor architecture. More recently the light quality of metal halide has improved to such a level that it has found solid ground in retail lighting. As energy consumption is such a dominant cost factor, most professional light sources ...
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