US Power Letter

The DesignLights Consortium as ‘Big Brother’

Dear Reader:

It should be comforting to the Facilities Manager to know that there is oversight being provided the manufacturers on the efficacy of each fixture manufactured, particularly those that stand to qualify for various rebates, tax credits and other forms of subsidies. This is provided by a non-profit organization known as DesignLights Consortium, which assesses – and ultimately passes judgement on – every LED fixture, via a formal rating process.

In order for a fixture to pass muster, qualifying it for utility rebates, it must be judged to be energy efficient, and categorized by this entity, known generally as the DLC.

Started in 2009 by Northeast Energy Efficiency Partnerships, “NEEP set a goal to accelerate market adoption of quality, efficient commercial sector LED lighting to reduce lighting energy use by 50 percent”. An immediate success, in 2016, NEEP spun off the DesignLights Consortium as an independent non-profit serving the U.S. and Canada.

Many of the DLC’s members are utility companies who have a vested interest in ensuring the projects they are subsidizing with their rebate money result in the installation of quality, energy efficient products. By and large, they’re all ‘on the hook’ to their state utility commissions for a minimum kW reduction per year for each of their conservation programs, and a coordinated effort to assess and ultimately pass judgement on each fixture accrues to their benefit, in addition to the ultimate buyer. We’re loath to use cliché terms here, but this really is a win-win situation.

Many of our readers are well-aware of our industrial lighting contracting company, and those who are know that we have a particular expertise with networked controls. The DLC website dedicates an entire section to this portion of the lighting category, and you can find it here: DLC – Networked Lighting Control.

In the past, when we’ve been involved in due diligence on what ultimately became selection processes around controls platforms, we’ve found this portion of DLC’s website to be invaluable. It’s one thing to listen to a manufacture extol the virtue of his/her product; it’s something very different for an independent 3rd party to not only do so, but to quantify and compare how it stacks up compared to its competition.

On the fixture front, the DesignLights Consortium requires lighting products to comply with minimum performance standards in three critical areas: distribution, color and longevity/stress. We think you’ll find it to be an important part of your toolbox.