High bay LED lighting is the indoor lights that are commonly mounted via a pendant, or directly to a ceiling. These types of lights are mounted higher on an average of 15 feet high. High bay lighting is used in warehouses, retail areas, and industrial facilities.
Despite the quality of these types of lights, there are also some common problems that can lead to issues, here in this article we will focus and counter three basic issues: cost, maintenance cost, and overall performance.
Here are the 3 common issues described below:
Energy Costs
High bay lights range from 175 watts to 1000 watts depending on the fixture and application. The higher you choose wattage, the higher the light output. These lights are mounted at the height of the ceiling; therefore, this factor plays a role in the wattage that is utilized.
If we calculate in dollar value to this wattage, a 400 watt or 1000 watt HID fixture (which is a very common wattage for high bay lighting) can cost up to $205 and $520 approx to operate per light, in a year. Higher costs can often add up unnecessarily.
Maintenance Costs
With referring to the high energy costs, maintenance costs are often a concern for those who are managing: commercial light fixtures and warehouse lighting. High bay lighting is commonly installed at the height of the ceilings. These lights often require the use of a lift to change out a lamp. If a building doesn’t own a lift and therefore must hire an outside contractor to maintain these types of fixtures, which can raise the cost of maintenance
These maintenance expenses can add up over a few years. For example, it can easily cost up to $1,200 approx in labor and materials to maintain a single high bay light fixture for over 2 years.
Lighting Performance
The characteristics highly depend on the type of lights installed in your facility. Metal halide lamps produce a ‘whiter’ shade of light. However, these types of lamps tend to decrease the light output after the initial install process.
On the other side, if you are using high-pressure sodium lamps, you may see and observe a longer useful life as these lamps see less lumen degradation than metal halide. However, their fuel structure produces a very ‘orange’ light with a very low CRI.
Although before we move towards our final verdict, these lights are essential in the few places where other lights won't work effectively, if you have a lift in building and budget for maintenance costs, definitely you should opt for high bay lighting for a better view and right amount of brightness.
Verdict
With referring to these details, we got to know that it consumes more energy, which results in higher energy costs, higher maintenance costs, and overall lighting performance issues associated with metal halide and high-pressure sodium lamps.
These issues can raise the concerns of a lifetime capability and performance of LED high bay lighting.
