Fieldhouse, ice arena get new lighting

BY SARA EISENHAUER
News Editor

New high-efficiency lighting will replace old fixtures and save Saint Mary’s University $9,179 a year for lighting in the Gostomski Fieldhouse and $1,935 a year in the SMU Ice Arena, according to John Schollmeier, maintenance director of the physical plant.

“We hope to increase the quality of the lighting and cut our usage down,” Schollmeier said. The new lighting will not only save money each year on electricity by using lower-wattage bulbs, but it will also improve the light quality, which is the color given off, Schollmeier said. Light quality is measured in comparison to sunlight. On the light quality scale, sunlight is measured at 100. As the numbers decrease, the light color goes from a bright white to having blue or yellow tones. Both the light quality scores in the fieldhouse and ice arena will improve from around 60 to about 90 with the new bulbs, Schollmeier said.

An induction lighting system, which is a form of lighting that provides a longer bulb life and creates energy savings, will replace the 1000-watt bulbs in the fieldhouse with 400-watt bulbs, Schollmeier said. The new bulbs and fixtures are guaranteed for 10 years, and the lights will come on instantaneously as compared to the old system, which would take 15-20 minutes to reach full brightness.

The university chose to join in a partnership with American Induction Technologies, Inc. (AITI) for the project to get the best deal on the fieldhouse lighting. In exchange, the fieldhouse will serve as an example of the induction lighting system that AITI provides to show other potential buyers in the area how the system functions. SMU is the first group in the area to take on the replacement of an entire fieldhouse with induction lighting, Schollmeier said. The lighting system that replaced the bulbs in the ice arena are not an induction system, but the old 400-watt bulbs were replaced with high-efficiency 330-watt bulbs, Schollmeier said.

Schollmeier said the university has done “extensive metering on what (the new lighting) is going to save” and chose AITI because the project, which would have originally cost about $50,000, will only total around $20,000 because of the partnership. Anytime the maintenance department comes forward with any longterm savings projects, the administration has been very supportive, Schollmeier said. He added that the athletic department has been supportive as well.