NULTY+ TRENDS IN LIGHTING DESIGN: CIRCULAR ECONOMY

TIME FOR ACTION

We’re all aware of how important the circular economy is to global climate change. The issue is top of the agenda and we’re all talking about it, but it’s clear that the time has come for action.

In the lighting design world, this means making strides towards circular economy principles - as quickly as possible. We need to adopt a more holistic approach to our designs and build an accurate picture of the whole life cycle of a product. It’s a challenge that we wrestle with daily as we wade through reams of data to understand design, materials, manufacturing, distribution, and repair, and work creatively to find ways to repurpose or recycle a fitting at the end of its life.

It's a big task, but fortunately we’re seeing a new level of collaboration across the lighting community and a concerted effort to share knowledge and move forward as an industry. Cue TM66, an industry-wide framework developed by CIBSE and the SLL that improves the process of assessing the circularity of luminaires.

The CEAM assessment tools in TM66 allow us to interrogate manufacturing processes and assign every product a single figure rating. With this data, we’re better informed. We can make like-for-like comparisons and be transparent about how luminaires perform in the context of the circular economy.

Like everyone in the lighting design industry, we’re embracing TM66 as we refine the way we work. Our teams now include TM66 scores for every luminaire that we specify on our schedules. As a practice, we’ve set ourselves a target of achieving a 2 and above score for 50% of specified luminaires on every project over the next six months.

Providing the right intentions have been set for a project, there’s no reason why we can’t achieve this target – and strive to better it. We know it’s not enough to give a nod to the environmental impact of our designs, so we’re committed to being more accountable for all that we specify.