---

Halogen Uplights And Hot Ceilings

---

Photo The lamp temperature of a compact fluorescent torchiere (left) is often cooler than the temperature at which even the housing of a halogen torchiere radiates (right). (Thermograph from LBNL Lighting Fixtures Laboratory)

In the early 1980s, a graceful new lighting concept emerged from the design houses of Italy. Marrying the brilliant, high-output linear halogen lamp with a two-meter-high, sleek, metal uplight, the halogen torchiere (or halogen uplighter) proved to be extremely popular. For homeowners seeking warm, diffuse uplight, the torchiere had immediate appeal. Against a wall, it could function like a very bright sconce; in the middle of a room, it could function as the primary ambient light source, fully dimmable and movable.

Though these early torchieres were quite expensive (selling for hundreds of dollars US), prices began falling rapidly as generic designs were stamped out by the millions in Asia and exported, ready to assemble, in small, rectangular cartons. By 1993-1994, prices had fallen to US$30 or less, and millions of torchieres were being sold annually, not just in lighting speciality stores, but also in home improvement centers, discount clubs, and department stores. Today, a complete torchiere with halogen bulb can be purchased for $12 in many places in the US.

According to the largest importers of torchieres in the United States, annual sales have risen from 10 to 15 million units in 1994 to about 18 million units in 1996 - accounting for more than 10% of all luminaire sales of all types, residential and commercial. Given the explosive, recent growth in sales and relatively short operating lifetime, we estimate that about 40 million of the original 50 million torchieres sold in the US may still be in operation.

STRONG GLOBAL TREND
Other data (see Table 1 ) suggest that in many industrialized countries the pattern is similar to that in the US, whereas in developing countries the products have not yet shown up or are just beginning to do so.

In the Netherlands, torchieres are already found in 20 to 30% of the nation's six million households. After only six years of imports, three million have been sold.

In France, about 7 million halogen torchieres have been sold since their introduction in the early 80s. In 1990, sales peaked at 1.5 million units - about one for every 13 households. Sales growth has also been meteoric there, rising at 200% per year until the products represented 10% of all residential fixtures sold and as much as 80% of the dollar value of retail light fixture sales.

In Sweden, torchiere sales have been increasing steadily over the last two years. A limited number of fluorescent alternatives are available, but are aimed primarily at the high-end commercial marketplace. Countries like South Africa appear to be seeing halogen torchieres on the shelf for the first time. New Zealand and Australia, in spite of their proximity to the manufacturing centers of Asia, have not been active markets for torchieres thus far.

Home construction practices are a major influence: US homebuilders often allocate less than one percent of their construction budget to lighting, providing only switched outlets in many bedrooms. By contrast, homebuilders in New Zealand, for instance, and in many European countries routinely provide central, switched lighting in all rooms, reducing the need for portable fixtures.

POOR EFFICACY
The overwhelming success of these products in the residential marketplace has led to a number of problems: First, the torchieres are consuming a tremendous amount of energy. Packaged with 300-, 500- or even 600-watt lamps, the fixtures have substantially increased residential energy use. Based on sales and usage estimates, it can be concluded that halogen torchieres are using more energy than all compact fluorescent lamps are saving in the United States, the Netherlands, and potentially a number of other countries.

Halogen torchieres are occasionally marketed as energy efficient and are widely perceived by purchasers to be so. However, testing has shown that they are comparable to, or even less efficient than, many typical incandescent fixtures. Most are sold with very inexpensive halogen lamps, which appear to produce far fewer lumens than their nominal ratings would suggest. At full power, the halogen lamps in torchieres typically produce about 10 to 15 lumens per watt; at one third power, they produce only 2 or 3 lumens per watt - an efficiency level approximating that of Thomas Edison's original prototype light bulb in 1879!

Second, the fixtures distribute light in a manner not optimally suited to all room types. Rooms with ceilings that are dark or high often absorb much of the light from torchieres before it is reflected back to surfaces at eye level. The result is an intensely bright spot of light on the ceiling directly above the torchiere, and substantially less light on the walls and floor below it. Though 300 or 500 watts of halogen light can yield lighting levels bright enough to read by, so can 20 to 50 watts in a portable halogen reading light or downlight.

FIRE HAZARDS
Because the largest fraction of a halogen bulb's power use produces heat instead of visible light, the bulbs are, not surprisingly, very hot. What many users do not realize, however, is just how hot they are. While typical incandescent lamp-wall temperatures range from 70 to 250 degrees C, halogens range from 350 degrees in 300-W products to 500 degrees C in 500-W products. The kindling temperature of paper, woven fabric and wood, by comparison, ranges from 180 to 260 degrees C.

Since halogen torchieres are open on the top, it is not difficult for these combustibles to come in contact with the surface of the lamp, causing them to ignite. The US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) has documented dozens of cases of such fires. In some, torchieres were inadvertently placed too close to draperies, bedding or artificial plants; in others, the halogen bulbs shattered, scattering hot fragments of quartz on nearby combustibles.

The CPSC is continuing to investigate the safety record of torchieres and can exercise any number of remedial actions affecting products already sold. It could recall some or all of them, mandate a retrofit to improve safety, or ask manufacturers to contribute to a fund that would educate consumers about the potential hazards of torchieres and give them tips on how to operate the products more safely. In December 1996, Dateline NBC, an investigative US television news program, aired an in-depth story on halogen torchiere safety, putting additional pressure on the CPSC to take action.

By contrast, the safety requirements imposed by the IEC on halogen torchieres sold in Europe and Asia are modest, primarily addressing their electrical integrity, prevention of electric shock, and susceptibility to tipover. As a result, some halogen fixtures are sold there without integral glass guards to filter UV radiation and contain quartz fragments in the event of catastrophic lamp failure. In the United States, Underwriters Laboratories (UL) has been testing a wider range of issues, including switch endurance, overlamping, operating temperature of non-lamp components, security of the lamp containment barrier, and inclusion of warning labels.

However, even this array of tests failed to prevent numerous fires in 1995 and 1996 from torchieres being operated too close to combustible materials. Under pressure from the CPSC, UL added an "unintentional operation" test to its procedure. Beginning on February 5, 1997, no torchiere can be UL-listed if a cotton cheesecloth draped over the bowl chars or ignites after seven hours of continuous operation. This has forced manufacturers to redesign their torchieres in numerous ways. About 50 to 75 companies have submitted torchieres to UL for testing in the past; a number have already secured approval of their revised designs.

EFFICIENT AND SAFE ALTERNATIVES
The energy-efficient alternative, making the fixture safer by using a cooler-running, fluorescent light source, is being largely ignored. The few products available are mostly targeted for the high-end, commercial market. Together with Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, Alsy Lighting (in the US) is currently developing relatively low-cost torchieres that use the "2D" fluorescent lamp for the household market. The General Electric 2D appears, in many ways, to be ideally suited to torchiere applications. Its flat profile is a close fit to the contour of existing torchiere bowls. Three-way switchable and dimming electronic ballasts are already available for it, and its high light output closely approximates both the quantity and distribution of light from traditional halogen designs.

Though the early Alsy products will use GE's 38-W 2D, the second-generation product (expected to ship in 1st quarter 1997) will employ GE's new 55-W 2D. With proper ballasting and a suitable reflector, this lamp can produce more uplight than a 300-W halogen with 75-80% fewer watts.

Other designs employ multiple "quad" (four-finger) lamps and individual reflectors. Energy Federation Incorporated is currently manufacturing such products in China. Of its first 200 prototypes, 100 are committed to a pilot test at Harvard University, while another 50 have been purchased by Madison Gas & Electric Company for testing in a public housing project in Wisconsin.

Finally, a number of metal-halide torchieres have been demonstrated both in Europe and the United States. Though the products offer very high efficacy and precise beam control, they are likely to be expensive to manufacture, will require significant warm-up times to reach full brightness, and may not match the color of halogens as closely as many consumers would like. Nevertheless, the metal-halide technology continues to improve rapidly - thanks, in part, to sources designed for the automotive industry -and may figure prominently in future designs on both sides of the Atlantic.

PROMOTIONAL EFFORTS
Efforts to promote the alternative products have been helped by the safety concerns associated with traditional halogens. Not only do the new products cut energy use by enough to repay their incremental cost in one to two years, but they are inherently safer - converting more of their energy to visible light and less to heat. As the thermograph on page 3 illustrates, the lamp temperature of a fluorescent torchiere is often cooler than the temperature at which even the housing of a halogen torchiere radiates.

Colleges and universities may prove to be the market in which efficient torchieres first take hold. Not only do they face extraordinary liability concerns in their dormitories, but they are also paying the energy bills for the students that choose to augment institutional lighting with their own torchieres (early US surveys reveal 0.3 to 0.5 torchieres per dormitory student). As a result of numerous dormitory fires, a handful of colleges throughout the United States have already banned the use of halogen torchieres in their dormitories; dozens of others are contemplating such a move.

Some universities may choose to purchase the CFL products outright, making them a part of installed equipment in the dormitories and holding students' deposits if the products are removed or damaged by year's end. Others may give the fixtures to residential students in their first year, assuming that the investment will already by recouped on energy bills by the time the students graduate. Still others may simply choose to provide a rebate for the cost difference between typical torchieres and the alternatives. Since the fluorescent designs are expected to sell for between $40 and $70, the initial investment could yield life-cycle savings of $30 to $50 million across the two million US dormitory residents.

The US Environmental Protection Agency intends to launch an Energy Star labelling effort for residential light fixtures in 1997. Efficient torchieres can be expected among the early qualifying products. Labeled products will gain a substantial marketing advantage in the competitive marketplace for residential fixtures, especially if federal procurement and utility programs endorse and use the Energy Star specification. The current draft requires that portable fixtures of greater than 22 watts provide either three-way switching or dimming in order to receive the Energy Star, and includes additional efficacy and performance qualifications.

Chris Calwell
Evan Mills

• Chris Calwell is a US Colorado-based freelance writer, researcher and photographer specializing in energy and the environment. He has been working with the US Environmental Protection Agency and ESource on the torchiere issue.
  Email: cjcalwell@aol.com cjcalwell@aol.com
• Evan Mills is Associate Editor of the IAEEL Newsletter.
  Email: emills@lbl.gov
  
  The authors gratefully welcome further information on this issue.
  
  
• For information on the US Energy Star Labeling Program, contact Lena Nirk at US EPA.
  Tel: +1 202 233 9841
  Fax: +1 202 233 9575
  Email: nirk.lena@epamail.epa.gov
  
  
• E Source torchiere report, contact: E Source,
  Fax: +1 303 440 8502
  E-mail: esource@esource.com

Top of page