The Port of Houston Authority initiated a $6,000,000 lighting conversion project to convert three key facilities from high-pressure sodium lighting to LEDs.
The maintenance team were overburdened with replacing unreliable sodium lights. Upgrading lighting to LEDs reduced the overall number of lighting fixtures by 50% each of which have an expected lifespan of over 100,000 hours – fully supported by our 10-year warranty on all LED lighting.
Maintenance engineers from the Port of Houston worked with Constellation Lighting to dramatically improve illumination within the warehouse facilities for greater worker safety, reduced maintenance, and to realise significant energy cost savings.
The LED lighting upgrades within the Port of Houston warehousing facilities have delivered a 52% energy cost saving, compared to their pre-upgrade costs.
Warehousing at the Port of Houston Container Terminal
The Port of Houston is one of the busiest container terminals in the U.S. handling more than 247 million tons of cargo every year. In 2019, the Port ranked first and second in the U.S. for total export and import waterborne tonnage. With almost 200 private and public industrial terminals, and home to the second largest petrochemical facility in the world – the largest in the U.S. – the Port of Houston is a complex site to manage.
Warehousing is an integral part of the Port’s daily operations. The vast warehousing area of the Port is home to countless businesses handling goods for export and import, as well as peripheral services to keep Port operations running efficiently every day.
Many of the warehouses in this vast complex run 24 hours, 7 days a week, with warehouse throughput playing a critical role in meeting the demanding cargo schedule.
As part of the Port of Houston Lighting Conversion project, Constellation are addressing the challenges of poor illumination, and the high costs and energy consumption of existing sodium lighting used within the warehouses. The project scope includes facilities located at Barbour Cut Terminal, Bayport Container Terminal, and Turning Basin Terminal.
Sodium lighting provides poor visibility for warehouse operatives working to a tight schedule. Worker safety is paramount to the Port of Houston, which quality illumination goes a long way to achieving. Not only does sodium lighting provide poor visual acuity for workers, but it also has high electricity costs and requires regular maintenance to replace failed lamps.
Warehouse Challenges with Unreliable Sodium Lighting
Working with the Port of Houston maintenance engineers on Phase 2 of the project, Constellation replaced the existing high-pressure sodium lighting in warehouses 21 and 22. A total of 400 sodium 150-Watt lights were replaced with a total 150 Orbit 200-Watt LED Lights.
In warehouses 18-19, Phase One of the LED lighting conversion project, vapor-proof lighting was installed to cope with the storage conditions in this area of Port operations. Constellation used the Venus Vapor Proof LED range to provide a robust lighting solution which can withstand rigorous washdown procedures and are food grade IP69X rated. Constellation replaced a total of 254 sodium 250-Watt lights with a total of 144 Venus 100-Watt LEDs.
The Orbit LED range is constructed using a high-quality diecast Aluminum heatsink with a durable powder coating to deliver a robust product – built to last. Using a high-performance driver – a self-contained supply to regulate power – Orbit LEDs offer outstanding performance over the course of their expected 100,000-hour lifetime.
LED Lighting Reduces Maintenance Hours
All warehouses in this phase of the Lighting project required less than half the number of LEDs to replace their sodium counterparts, with a dramatic increase in lighting quality.
All Constellation LEDs are provided with a 10-year warranty which demonstrates the proven track record of LED reliability and build quality. LEDs are installed with an expected lifespan of 100,000 hours illumination, as a result, the demands on the maintenance team at the Port of Houston have been greatly reduced.
The power consumption of LED technology is minimal compared to sodium lighting – the Port of Houston has saved 52% in energy costs by switching from sodium to LED lighting.
