DesignLights Consortium® Launches Networked Lighting Controls Qualified Products List
Design Lights, June 28, 2016
The DesignLights Consortium® is pleased to announce the launch of its Qualified Products List for Networked Lighting Control (NLC) Systems. The first product to meet performance specifications, the RAB Lightcloud system, was published on the list on Monday, June 27.
We are excited that Lightcloud is the first networked control system qualified by DLC, said Ross Barna, CEO of RAB Lighting. The DLC specification creates new market opportunities for us, greater savings, and access to rebates for our customers, and we can differentiate our control system among the myriad of offerings in the North American market.
The NLC Qualified Products List equips lighting designers, specifiers, contractors, building owners, and utility energy efficiency programs with a valuable information resource to understand and evaluate Networked Lighting Control systems in this rapidly evolving sector. For lighting controls manufacturers and their customers, it provides access to efficiency incentives and greater product visibility in markets across North America.
“Looking to the future, utilities will increasingly direct their rebates to Networked Lighting Control technologies in order to meet the energy savings targets placed on them by their regulators,” says Gabe Arnold, the DesignLights Consortium’s Program Manager. A recent survey of DLC Member utilities indicated that at least 25% of those polled plan to require Networked Controls to be listed on the DLC QPL as soon as it contains a sufficient number of systems, and 50% plan to require it by 2017. As more products meet the minimum specification, utilities will use the list to determine what systems are eligible for rebates.
As the implementation of Networked Lighting Controls increases in importance for energy efficiency incentives and rebate programs, the performance specifications and Qualified Products List for NLCs has the potential to become as influential as the DLC’s existing Solid State Lighting Qualified Products List, which currently contains almost 185,000 qualified products.
The Networked Lighting Controls Specification and Qualified Products List is part of a larger Commercial Advanced Lighting Controls (CALC) initiative by the DesignLights Consortium, which will encompass a suite of tools and resources to enable widespread adoption of Networked Lighting Controls in commercial buildings. Working in partnership with utilities, energy efficiency programs, and the lighting industry, the DLC will deploy the tools (which include the Qualified Products List, an Advanced Lighting Controls System Energy Estimator, training programs and resources, and demonstrations of Networked Lighting Control technologies) over the course of 2016.