LED Lighting for a brighter future!

Megaman lamps have been chosen for the refurbishment of St Johns church in Meopham, Kent. The project involved a complete re-design of the lighting and the addition of bespoke fittings, in addition to the rewiring and installation of lighting controls throughout the ancient building. CES are experts in design and installation in listed buildings, particularly ecclesiastical and worked closely with Megaman to come up with a scheme that was sympathetic to the surroundings but that also provided the improved light levels whilst saving energy. St Johns is a large fourteenth-century church with a wooden pulpit, made for St Margaret's, Westminster, in 1682 and brought here in 1800. The former chantry chapel of Simon de Mepham (1272-1333), Archbishop of Canterbury, and a fourteenth-century political pawn, is linked to the chancel by an iron-grilled window. Like any historic building, providing good ambient light can be a problem but Megaman provided a solution with its dimmabl...

Simply LED: M&S first trialled LED lighting in its store on Ecclesall Road in Sheffield. This week the retailer announced that it will roll out LED lighting to all its food halls Lux reports: Marks & Spencer is introducing LED lighting to all its food halls over the next two years, the retailer announced this week.100 M&S Simply Food stores will be lit by LED throughout, and a further 300 food halls and Simply Food stores will get LED lights in refrigerators. M&S announced its LED rollout in an update on its ‘Plan A’ environmental and CSR strategy. The report said:  'LED lighting is more energy efficient and longer lasting than more traditional forms of lighting. It is better for customers, directly focusing light on shelves and products to give a better visual experience.’ LED is described in the report as a key element of M&S’s strategy to meet its Plan A energy-efficiency commitments to reduce energy usage by 35 per cent by 2015 and 50...

Sainsbury's has begun a massive nationwide rollout of LED lighting in hundreds of shops. The supermarket chain aims to eventually make all its stores 100% LED, reducing its energy bill for lighting by more than half. Lux reports exclusively on the project and meets the team behind it. Sainsbury’s was an early adopter of LED lighting. The supermarket giant has been looking into LED technology for about seven years, first for refrigerator lighting, and later feature lighting and car parks. Over time, as the technology got more powerful, it spread to more applications. Last year marked a milestone. Sainsbury’s opened the doors of its first all-LED store – a brand new hypermarket in Leek, Staffordshire, which consumes about 60 per cent less energy for lighting than comparable stores (with the same nice even illumination) thanks the GE ‘Blade’ fitting. But that was just one shop. Now, the use of high-tech low-energy lighting at Sainsbury’s is no longer the exception, it i...

Fit for an acquisition:  Sweden's ITAB, which sells retail shop fittings and lighting such as above, has acquired the UK's Profile Lighting. If takeovers by larger foreign companies are a sign of a country's buoyant lighting market, then things are well afloat in the UK, where overseas groups this month alone have acquired two lighting firms. First, Japan's Endo Lighting picked up Warrington-based family run Ansell, followed quickly by Sweden's ITAB acquisition of Hertfordshire-based Profile Lighting. Osaka-based Endo, a ¥38.8 billion (£209 million) 47-year-old company known for its LEDZ brand of LED lighting products, acquired Ansell for ¥6.5 billion, or  roughly £35 million . 'We are pleased to announce that Ansell Electrical Products Limited and Ansell (Sales & Distribution) Limited have been acquired by Endo Lighting Corporation of Japan,'  Ansell announced  in a short press release. 'Ansell will now operate as a wholly owned subs...

Marathon Man:  Gregor Paterson-Jones and the Green Investment Bank are in the street lighting business for the long run. Their municipal loans for LED luminaires and poles can last for as long as 30 years, allowing cities to repay through energy savings. Lux LONDON - The bank that the UK government established to back energy efficiency and renewable power projects is pushing hard into LED streetlighting with a financial product that lets municipalities repay a loan over decades, by using money saved from energy savings. The Green Investment Bank will offer loans of as long as 30 years - a length that's hard to find in the commercial banking world - Gregor Paterson-Jones, co-director of energy efficiency, told an audience at LuxLive. The GIB recently completed a loan agreement with Glasgow City Council to fund 10,000 new LED streetlight luminaires. With that as a model, it is now reaching out to other localities. Paterson-Jones encouraged municipalit...