Warehouse Lighting
Safety and efficiency are essential to effective warehouse working, and warehouse lighting has a pivotal role to play in helping to ensure both.
Warehousing costs are a big part of overall logistics expenses, which makes efficiencies vital for helping customers improve their margins, and providing a competitive service. Lighting can account for 80% of a warehouse’s total energy bill.
Upgrading to energy efficient LED lighting can ensure warehouses get better value for money, including more efficient lighting and longer bulb lifetimes.
The benefits do not stop there, however, because the quality of LED lighting is also a key part of ensuring safer working practices and improving productivity.
Warehouse Lighting and the Human Factor
The Health & Safety Executive (HSE) points out that the work environment can have a profound impact on the people working in it, and that lighting is one of the effects that can reduce an individual’s ability to perform a task.
A key principle in lighting is that the more detailed the task, the more light is required to do it well, and do it safely. Lighting large warehouse spaces sufficiently, where consistency is required, can prove challenging.
It makes sense, therefore, to use a professional lighting supplier, and to treat warehouse lighting as a long-term investment.
Another critical factor in warehouse lighting systems is glare control. Directional sources of light can bounce off reflective surfaces and cause glare. Glare is especially hazardous in situations where employees are handling and transporting goods.
Many warehouses will have high racking storage systems, adding to the potential for accidents.
LED technology has advanced to a stage where there is a good choice of LED products which include effective glare control.
Improving working conditions can have a positive effect on productivity, helping to increase employee output, and upgrading lighting systems is an obvious way of making these sort of improvements.
What Can Warehouses Save with LED Lighting?
Typically, a warehouse might have fluorescent tubes and halogen lights, or metal halide low and high bay floodlighting.
None of these types of light are energy efficient, but they have LED equivalents that most definitely are.
For example, a standard incandescent lamp lasts for up to 8,000 hours, but with an LED it is up to 70,000 hours.
LEDs allow warehouses to reduce their carbon footprint, and to save on ongoing lighting maintenance costs. In fact, within six months, an LED lighting system can pay for itself, while ultimately saving the warehouse thousands of pounds in energy costs.
Tips for Warehouse Lighting and Energy Efficiency
It is best to think of warehouse lighting as a total lighting system, encompassing the most efficient use of energy of an entire space, related closely to how it is going to be used.
Therefore, along with optimising this lighting, it makes sense to install sensors and controllers, which then allows the use of light only where and when it is required.
Review lighting regularly, because warehouse requirements are prone to change, especially in an age where online retail and efficient home delivery have become very much the norm.
In addition to LEDs, also consider the best use of space by expanding upwards rather than across.
Maintain a suitable warehouse environment by making the most efficient use of entrances and exits. This means not leaving doors open around the clock. Heating or cooling can also contribute significantly to energy costs.
Warehouse safety and efficiency go hand-in-hand, and choosing the right lighting system is an excellent way of making impactful, immediate improvements.
Get in Touch
At Altitude Services, we are energy saving specialists. We can help you review your warehouse lighting, and provide the LED alternatives that can help transform your space. Please contact us for more information.
Call us on 01282 450525, or complete our online enquiry form, and we will be in touch as soon as possible.
