Light + Health

My contribution to the March 2020 issue of ELECTRICAL CONTRACTOR covered what we know about the blue light hazard.

Dr. Greg Murphy, a Republican Congressman from North Carolina, recently said sunlight can kill the novel coronavirus, but experts say the sun’s UV emission that reaches the earth’s surface isn’t enough to prove out as a disinfectant.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic and a wave of seemingly conflicting statements and opinions about the disinfection capabilities and safety of GUV, the Illuminating Engineering Society has issued a report by their Photobiology Committee explaining germicidal ultraviolet (GUV) disinfection and its potential to safely reduce the transmission of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.

National Lighting Bureau executive director and EdisonReport editor Randy Reid interviewed Dr. Mark Rea of the Lighting Research Center to talk about UV lighting applications for COVID-19.

The Lighting Research Center (LRC) has released a new video on how to maintain good sleep while working from home or quarantining indoors.

Supporting the global action to reduce the transmission of COVID-19, the International Commission on Illumination (CIE) recently released two key publications on ultraviolet radiation disinfection, now available free.

In collaboration with the International WELL Building Institute (IWBI), the International Association of Lighting Designers (IALD) has launched guidelines for lighting manufacturers to help lighting designers more easily determine if their designs meet the WELL Building Standard criteria. The WELL v2™ pilot is the latest version of the WELL Building Standard, a rating system that focuses exclusively on the way that buildings and everything in them—including lighting—can improve our comfort and enhance our health and wellness.

In December 2019, UL published Design Guide 24480, which provides guidance on how to design lighting systems that support circadian entrainment. To learn more, I talked to Adam Lilien, Global Business Development Manager, Lighting, UL, LLC. The resulting interview informed an article I wrote for the May issue of ELECTRICAL CONTRACTOR.

In a research project funded by the National Institute on Aging (NIA), Dr. Mariana Figueiro, Professor and Director at the Lighting Research Center (LRC) at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, is investigating whether a tailored lighting intervention can lessen the impact of these symptoms in older adults living with Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRD) and has published her latest findings in the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine.