I don’t know about you, but I thought I knew a fair amount about lighting. CFLs, check. LED, check. Odd designer bulbs, check. LEDs are more efficient than everything else, right? Not so, as I learned in the latest GreenSmith Session with Andre Lucero of Lucero Design, a lighting design & consulting firm out of San Francisco.
I also learned how those glaring mercury vapor based monsters in streetlights called metal halides have now made the transformation to ceramic metal halides, in tiny sizes, useable even in store displays. And that they’re quite efficient and long lasting.
Lucero made a surprising, brilliantly simple economic case for businesses using better lighting: Longer life equals less staff time and materials used replacing them. In a store with hundreds or thousands of lights, this makes absolute sense, whether or not you’re convinced of the ecological case for a change in lighting.
Listen in as Lucero gives useful, easily implemented suggestions for both home and business lighting. If you’re looking for a good green lighting company, Lucero suggests B-K Lighting, whose factory is completely off the grid, and its lighting fixtures are made from recyclable materials.
Best quote? When asked about the future of sustainable lighting, Lucero said, “…they might have one that substitutes mayonnaise rather than mercury…”
And do keep an ear out for the Blue Angels!
Listen in and I’d love your comments, additional resources, and questions.
image via Plumen
Click here to play or save GreenSmith Sessions #4 Andre Lucero
Paul Smith is a sustainable business innovator, the founder of GreenSmith Consulting, blogs weekly on green start ups of note at Triple Pundit and has an MBA in Sustainable Management from Presidio Graduate School in San Francisco. He creates interest in, conversations about, and business for green (and greening) companies, via social media marketing.
