Home Property Australia Let there be light How to boost wellbeing and productivity in buildings

Let there be light How to boost wellbeing and productivity in buildings

  • May 08, 2018

Let there be light: How to boost wellbeing and productivity in buildings

Lighting is a lynchpin of workplace health and wellbeing, says RMIT lecturer and Eagle Lighting Australia specialist Ian Johnson. And now a new VBE Index can quantify the value of high quality lighting. 

“We have irrefutable evidence, supported by peer reviewed research, that confirms carefully-planned quality lighting systems can deliver significant wellbeing and productivity gains,” says Johnson, Eagle Lighting Australia’s product application manager for lighting solutions.

And the trendline is headed in one direction.

“Product development and LED chip technology continues to improve year on year, energy consumption is down and ‘tier one’ lighting manufacturers continue to innovate,” Johnson says.

When well designed and implemented, lighting systems can boost health, safety and productivity, reduce error rates and absenteeism, and ultimately enhance business profits.

All these outcomes can be benchmarked through the WELL Building Standard and Green Star rating systems. 

Robert Kilkenny, Eagle Lighting Australia’s director of sales and marketing, says both systems “elevate the minimum design metrics within a building to deliver performance outcomes.”

But Eagle Lighting Australia is “not content with minimum ratings on a score card,” Kilkenny adds. 

“This is why we introduced the VBE Index to quantify the beneficial outcomes of lighting systems. The VBE Index is now part of the company’s DNA for every product we manufacture.”

VBE is an acronym for visual, biological and emotional – the three ways in which light affects human beings. 

The right light is essential for humans to see, read and carry out tasks proficiently. Lighting influences the secretion of hormones in our bodies, which in turn affects alertness, and also regulates mood.

“The VBE Index assesses a range of lighting attributes, from reducing glare and contrast, to delivering the correct spectral composition and colour quality,” Kilkenny adds.

“Getting the balance right to maximise productivity and wellbeing outcomes demands a total lighting system approach,” Kilkenny explains, adding that a high VBE Index exceeds the minimum requirements for both WELL and Green Star.

Eagle Lighting’s latest innovation is high spectrum LED lighting, with a colour rendering index (or CRI) of 90-plus. 

“This ensures better visual and light quality, something that is particularly important in working environments where correct colour is critical such as laboratories and hospitals,” Kilkenny adds.

“Our lighting can also enhance melanopic response, which influences our circadian rhythms, and which is required by WELL.

“Increasingly, smart lighting solutions are a health and productivity booster, and as the demand for WELL-rated buildings grows, we expect quality lighting to shine,” Kilkenny concludes. 

Eagle Lighting Australia designs and manufactures a large range of luminaires in its state-of-the art-facility in Melbourne. Learn more about Eagle Lighting.