Lighting Upgrade Advice To Overcome The UK Fluorescent Lamp Ban
In February 2024 UK legislation came in to force, disallowing the manufacture or importing of fluorescent and discharge lamps due to the restriction of hazardous substances (RoHS) regulations. This is due to the mercury contained within these lamps.
This legislation has come into effect before the EcoDesign legislation would have banned these lamps due to their poor energy efficiency.
Unless you have maintenance stocks, these lamps will become increasingly hard to source, making it more difficult and potentially more costly to maintain your existing fluorescent luminaires.
Many Emergency Lighting EXIT signs and bulkhead luminaires use 8W fluorescent lamps which do not last very long in “maintained” applications and these are also affected by this ban. Emergency lighting lamp failures could result in your emergency lighting not meeting the legal requirements and you should be taking steps to review your Emergency & Escape Lighting – if you are the “Responsible Person” for your building, estate or area, you are legally responsible for meeting these emergency lighting requirements.
One solution would be to swap out the old florescent for an aftermarket LED lamp as a quick and simple replacement. Unfortunately many LED tubes are of poor quality and likely to give poor quality lighting in terms of flicker, colour rendering, glare and distribution (affecting your staff). Plug-in lamp replacements could stop your Emergency Lighting from meeting it’s legal requirements.
LED replacement lamps usually score very badly in terms of circular economy measures as they are sealed units, cannot be serviced or maintained, have shorter life and have to be disposed of as combined waste rather than broken in to WEEE and other recyclable items.
Contact Llumarlite https://www.llumarlite.co.uk/ to help you Review your lighting needs to Refresh, Repair, Remanufacture, or Replace your lighting system with a safe, repairable, more efficient, effective and comfortable lasting lighting solution.
When used with a lighting control system, payback of remanufactured LED luminaires might be as little as 18 months due to savings in energy cost and maintenance, beyond which time reduced maintenance and energy costs will continue to minimise your lighting budget
Further resources
Learn more about these subjects (and how they may affect your project) can be found here:-
RoHS Fluorescent and Discharge Lamp Ban (Mercury content) – Government Legislation The Restriction of the Use of Certain Hazardous Substances in Electrical and Electronic Equipment (Amendment) Regulations 2023
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2023/658/made
Circular Economy – CIBSE/SLL TM66
