--A Look at How Two New Jersey Companies are Reaping the Rewards--

            Do you want to more than double your facility’s light levels, showcase your products or liven your office environment with brighter, more evenly distributed lighting and save thousands of dollars annually?   It’s been done, and you can benefit too.  

Facilities throughout New Jersey, including Salvatore Ferragamo USA’s Secaucus distribution center and Statco’s Jersey Cityproduct warehouse, have taken the steps to gain the above benefits, realizing a more aesthetically enhanced work or showroom area while also saving money.   How do they do it?

How to Reap the Rewards

These facilities are upgrading their lighting, a non-evasive, low-risk, fast ROI investment that can be installed with the added benefit of taking advantage of the money-saving New Jersey Clean Energy financial incentive rebate program.   Additionally, a lighting upgrade can be completed while still allowing for the continuation of day-to-day business productivity.   

Both Salvatore Ferragamo USA and Statco worked with Public Energy Solutions, a Paramus-based energy services company, to remove the lighting systems currently in place and replace them with newer, more efficient technologies.   The results are dramatic.

At the Salvatore Ferragamo USA’s 180,000 square foot distribution center, where high-end items from footwear to fragrances and scarves to sunglasses are shipped directly from Italy, then sent out to various boutiques throughout the United States, Public Energy Solutions removed 210 high bay metal halide fixtures, then replaced them all with new four-lamp T5HO fluorescent highbay fixtures using Universal electronic ballasts.   They also removed existing 8’ 2-F96/T12 strip fixtures located in low bay areas and installed new eight-foot fixtures with 2-4’ T8 lamps and specular reflectors, again using Universal electronic ballasts. The upgrade, in which Ferragamo received a rebate for, was completed in Q4 ’03.

            Additionally, because of Public Energy Solutions’ recent membership with PJM Interconnection, a regional electrical transmission organization and the largest independent system for the electrical grid, both Ferragamo and Statco have the opportunity to reap more savings.   The membership means that as companies effectively lower their facility’s energy consumption on peak days, they can sell back the power they don’t use; facilities of all sizes throughout New Jersey can receive a payment based on the total value of electric costs that are ultimately avoided through electrical load reduction and curtailment efforts.

Lighting Improvements and Savings Over $10,000 Annually

“The results are out of control,” says Ferragamo USA director of construction and building services Robert Kaden.   “Before the upgrade, our lighting levels throughout the warehouse were 18.8 footcandles.   Since the upgrade, the lighting really pops; the level has more than doubled to its current 40.6 footcandles.   The overall lighting quality, color rendering, uniformity of illumination and distribution is just amazing.”

Just as amazing are the savings that the distribution center is receiving.   Greg Summerlee, Public Energy Solutions’ VP of operations and lighting services specialist, was instrumental in this upgrade.   “Ferragamo USA will save approximately $14,000 annually in energy savings,” he says.   “Long term, that’s about $70,000 in their pocket after five years, and about $140,000 after 10 years, all while still obtaining the ongoing annual savings.”

“This savings is a 33 percent reduction on our electric bill,” says Kaden.   “There are not a lot of investments where I can easily say a project puts dollars back in our pocket, so this is just terrific.”

The savings get even better.

Six-Figure Savings

            Statco also used the services of Public Energy Solutions to upgrade the lighting in 3,000 fixtures.   The facility replaced eight foot, two lamp hooded fixtures and eight foot, six lamp hooded fixtures all with a new eight-foot reflectorized hood with two four-foot T8 lamps and electronic ballasts.  

Public Energy Solutions president Keith Hartman adds, “State of the art reflectors, like the ones now in use at Statco, redirects light with precision angling that is otherwise lost in non-focused light dispersion.   As a result, maximum lighting efficiency from the fluorescent tube is maximized instead of wasted.”  

Additionally, re-lamping your existing fluorescent magnetic ballast system to an electronic ballast system comprised of 32W T8 lamps saves an excess of 73 watts per every four-lamp fixture without compromising light distribution and output.   As a result, relamping in this manner translates to a savings of up to 50 percent.   And because electronic ballasts operate at significantly lower temperatures, air conditioning costs are reduced, creating a secondary savings.

“We secured a rebate, which was helpful,” says Jim Marzano,Statco president.   “But even more impressive is the projected annual energy savings of approximately over $112,000 that we will receive. To think that this means we’ll save over one million dollars in 10 years, with continued annual savings, is just tremendous.”

In addition to improved lighting quality and increased energy savings, there are a host of other benefits that both facilities will obtain.

Additional Benefits

• Reduction of replacement and maintenance costs – longer lasting, more efficient lighting means less time spent replacing inefficient lamps.   Fact:   Metal Halides lose approximately 25-40% of their lumen output over the course of their 20,000-hour lamp life, while T5s only lose about 5% of their lumen output during the same period of time.    Because Salvatore Ferragamo USA eliminated their metal halide lamps, they will not have to be concerned with timely replacement and maintenance costs.

• Competitive differentiation through improvement in employee productivity, overall safety – Because of the improved quality of lighting that both Salvatore Ferragamo USA

and Statco have due to their upgrades, productivity is enhanced, which in turn improves their facility’s asset value, leading to competitive differentiation in the marketplace.   Other companies that have not yet upgraded are still left struggling with excessive shadowing, which delays production and wastes money.

• Long-term positive financial returns on the upgrade investment – The return on investment is often realized within just a couple of years, when the significant annual energy savings take place.   In this way, the project pays for itself in a very short amount of time.
• Reduction in air pollution by conserving energy – By reducing the amount of energy that is often expended by using inefficient lighting, facilities lessen the need for reliance on power plants that burn fossil fuels to create energy.   Consider the fact that, according to current U.S. EPA figures, 82 percent of greenhouse gas emissions come from burning fossil fuels in order to generate electricity and power cars, and that 18 percent of U.S. carbon dioxide emissions are generated by the electricity needs of commercial buildings.

“As a result of our upgrade, Statco is helping the environment by reducing about 740 tons of carbon dioxide,” says Marzano.

Reap the Rewards for Yourself

If you’re looking for a way to save money for your facility, improve overall lighting quality, and obtain all of the additional benefits inherent in making such a difference, consider a lighting upgrade.  

You can’t afford not to.