The Benefits of Lighting Control
To answer what the benefits of Lighting Control are, we first have to briefly discuss what Lighting Control is. Lutron, a global leader in Lighting Control explains it like as:
“Light control is the ability to regulate the level and quality of light in a given space for specific tasks or situations. Controlling light properly not only enhances the experience, it helps to save energy by using light when and where it is needed most.”
To expand on this explanation, its important to note that Lighting Control can be broken up into two categories:
A) Control your lighting throughout your home from an app, switches, keypads, and
voice commands
B) Automated lights that turn on and off without any interaction from anyone
Using an app, switches, keypads or voice commands allows you to turn lights on or off without being at the switch. It’s very convenient, but also a way of expanding control in areas where wiring was less than ideal. Examples of this are stairwells where a light switch is at the top or the bottom, but not both. A battery powered switch can be added to the side of the stairwell that does not have a switch to give you control of that light. Without a Lighting Control system, you would have to have your electrician run wiring to that location, which in many cases will require cutting your wall to give access to run the wires. This creates further work as you will have to patch and repaint your walls. With Lighting Control, you would simply replace the switch that is already present, and install the battery powered switch on the wall, and with some minor programming, that’s it.
Another example of using Lighting Control to simplify manual use is in an area with multiple lighting loads (multiple switches) to control the lights in an area. My personal house has 4 light switches to control the lights in the same hallway/entry area. Replacing these switches with Smart Switches allows you to turn on all the lights at the same time (or off), to the same lighting level if utilizing dimmers, with the touch of one button.
How many times have your kids left all the lights on in the playroom in the basement? Imagine just checking your app to see if the lights are on, and shutting them off, without ever getting up out of your seat? In fact, at a quick glance at the app, you can see all of the lights that are on throughout the house (providing you place all of the lighting loads on the Lighting Control System. This is a very convenient way to ensure lights are not always on, thus saving you money on your energy bills
A popular method of Lighting Control and other Home Automation control in my house is through voice control. We have a young son, and during feeding and bed time, the convenience is very nice. We will walk into the room with him and sit down in the chair for feeding, and we tell the lights to dim, which will dim the lights to a set level. A good night scene is also popular, which will turn off all the lights and other components that are controlled, such as the TV. The ceiling fan, which is controlled via a wall switch, is also controllable within the app or via voice. This is wonderful at night, when you are in bed and feel a bit warm and without ever moving, just tell the fan to turn on.
We also integrate Lighting Control into Home Theaters, so that you are never sitting in a completely dark room. Rather than walking into a room to watch a movie, and turning the system on to provide some light and then going to turn the lights off, we simply have it all happen automatically. When you turn the system on, we have the lights slowly dim to off. This is especially beneficial if your Home Theater utilizes a Projector which takes a little bit of time to turn on before there is any light output. On the flip side, when turning the Home Theater off, we have the lights turn on to a preset dim level, so not only is there light, but it is not blindingly bright after sitting for 2 hours in a dark room watching a movie.
All of the examples above are just some of the great ways to utilizes a Lighting Control System through method A mentioned at the beginning of the blog. Lets talk a little bit about method B, fully automated Lighting Control.
Outdoor lighting is one of the most popular in terms of smaller Lighting Control Systems. It is sort of a doorway into a larger system. Why is this? The answer is simply that when you drive up to your house, you do not want to drive up to a dark house. Yes, you can utilize motion sensors in certain areas, but it’s a bit less elegant and limits you a bit on style of lighting you can use. It also will only light up a single area, or will often have different areas turning on and off at different times as motion is detected in different areas. A Lighting Control system will have all of the lights you wish to light up the exterior of your home turn on and off uniformly, each and every day.
Now, how many of you have purchased timer light switches in the past to turn on your outdoor lighting? What happens if you misplace the directions? The lights stay on that schedule for the life of that switch, right? They are overly complicated to program. Scheduling could not be any easier with a Lighting Control system. Not only can you program what lights turn on or off, and when, but you can have them turn on at a specific time based on an astronomical clock. In other words, you can have all your exterior lights, or specific exterior lights turn on at 15 minutes before dusk, rather than a specified time. When the seasons change and dusk settles in earlier or later, you will not have to reprogram anything. The lights will always turn on 15 minutes before dusk.
Automatic light paths which light your way when you arrive at home, vacation mode which randomly turns different lights on at random times, as well as remote access to turn your lights on or off from anywhere in the world are some more benefits to lighting control. Combining Lighting Control with HVAC control, automated blinds and shades as well as utilizing all LED bulbs and fixtures throughout the house also help create a more energy efficient home.
There is no right or wrong way to utilize Lighting Control, and often a combination of both the above methods is used. Many people hear the term Smart Home or Home Automation but are not too clear on what exactly this means. While there are multiple definitions to describe these terms, the short answer is simply that your home automatically triggers events, such as watering the lawn, control the homes Temperature at different times of the day/week/season, turning lights on and off based on your lifestyle…. Lighting Control is just a small part of a Smart Home, but a very important one as well, and usually the first entry many people have into Home Automation.