Category Archives: Electrical Posts

Lighting Trends: Everything is Changing, But Not Everyone is Keeping Up

By Craig G. Malesic, LC, PMP, EIT and Thomas G. Schubert, PE It’s an exciting time to be a lighting design professional. Innovation is rampant, building codes increasingly recognize the importance of lighting, and the sophistication of lighting and controls systems is at an all-time high. But this innovation is also creating several challenges. Here […]

Pedestrian Lighting: Establishing Lighting Levels for Safety & Security

  By Craig G. Malesic, LC, PMP, EIT In my last post, Pedestrian Lighting: A Case Study, I outlined a recent JDB Illumination  commission to provide pedestrian lighting for a neighborhood adjacent to a college campus. Exterior lighting is critical to create a safe environment whether for a college campus, business park, urban environment, parking lot, […]

Pedestrian Lighting: A Case Study

  by Craig G. Malesic, LC, PMP, EIT A longtime collegiate client reached out to JDB to discuss an off-campus project they hoped to spearhead: installing pedestrian lighting in a residential area adjacent to campus. As Simon Sinek likes to say, “Start with why,” so our first question was, “Why do you want to do […]

Understanding Selectable Color Temperature

  by Thomas G. Schubert, PE The lighting industry today is becoming saturated with talk of numerous new technologies, how they will enhance our lives in passive ways, and why we should buy into the hype. One such technology being pushed is selectable color temperature – the ability to program interior lighting fixtures to mimic […]

What is the Ideal Color Temperature for Your Lighting?

By Craig Malesic, LC, PMP, EIT In a prior post, Understanding Correlated Color Temperature (CCT), I shared insight about the quality of light color, from yellow to blue to “white hot.” In this post, we’ll continue exploring color temperature for lighting, and how lighting design professionals determine what makes the most sense for a given […]

Electrical Considerations for Variable Frequency Drives (VFD)

By Craig G. Malesic, LC, PMP, EIT with Brian E. Pitzer, PE and Rich M. Lindemon, PE, LEED AP Variable Frequency Drives (VFD) are commonplace in the design of mechanical systems. Where “VFD” is the most common terminology used, they are also called adjustable frequency drives, variable speed drives, and AC drives. Their primary use […]

Electrical Safety in the Workplace

By Brian E. Pitzer, PE Arc flash accidents are a leading cause of lost production time, and even death, resulting from electrical burns, electrocution, fires, and explosions. Arc flashes can be caused by dust and impurities, corrosion, condensation of vapor and water dripping, accidental touching, dropped tools, improperly designed equipment, or improper work procedures. Some […]

Understanding Correlated Color Temperature (CCT)

by Craig G. Malesic, PMP, LC, EIT Color temperature, which is also referred to as CCT (Correlated Color Temperature), is the chromaticity observed when a black body radiator is heated to a pre-determined temperature. The units are stated in degrees Kelvin, which indicates the temperature of the black body radiator. Well, as much as that […]

Solar Design 101: The Basics

by Thomas Schubert, PE, Electrical Engineer Almost everyone in the building design industry has worked with Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED), a green building certification program. When it comes to new construction, the credit with the largest potential points is the building’s total energy usage (LEED v4 EA Credit: Optimize Energy Performance). Even […]

Trying to Reduce Energy Consumption in Your Plant? Check These Two Important Components

By Timothy A. Warren, PE, LEED AP BD +C Continuing our conversation on industrial energy reduction that started here, we will discuss energy reduction for compressed air and pumping systems. Compressed air. This is probably the most expensive form of energy used in an industrial plant because of its poor efficiency – with an efficiency […]