Cree and USGBC install LED troffers, teach students about SSL

The multipurpose room at the North Carolina Zoo now features Cree LED-based lighting that was installed on the USGBC's Green Day of Service.

Cree has announced an LED lighting installation at the North Carolina Zoo located in Asheboro, NC, in conjunction with the US Green Building Council (USGBC). The solid-state lighting (SSL) installation took place on the USGBC's Center for Green Schools' Green Day of Service. Cree installed the LED troffers in the zoo's multipurpose room in the presence of students that participate in the zoo's Asheboro High School Science Program.

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Like many SSL installations, the zoo project will deliver considerable energy savings and improved quality of light relative to fluorescent troffers in an educational-oriented facility. Even as early as 2013 we published a feature article that documented benefits of SSL in such a setting. But the team behind the zoo project also used the installation as an educational tool. A goal was to have the students "learn how high-performance LED technology supports better, more energy-efficient learning environments."

"Where we learn matters," said Emily Scofield, executive director of the North Carolina Chapter of the USGBC. "Green building improvements like better lighting can enhance the learning environment for our students and save energy. Green Apple Day of Service demonstrates our support of North Carolina’s students, educators, and administrators by helping them achieve brighter spaces for education."

The Green Apple Day of Service is a program dedicated to improving school environments through service projects and is in its fourth year of existence. The organization seeks to find organizations such as Cree, called champions, to help enable projects with the inclusion of students, teachers, and parents. There will be more than a dozen such projects undertaken in North Carolina this year.

The USGBC has noted that schools are often burdened with aged lighting systems and other infrastructure inadequacies. The students using the multipurpose room at the zoo will now have an environment that's far more conducive to learning.

"The Green Apple Day of Service is helping transform schools into sustainable and healthy places to live, learn, work, and play while educating a new generation of consumers and leaders capable of driving global market transformation," said Scofield. "With the new Cree LED lighting, students and all users of the NC Zoo multi-purpose room can experience first-hand the difference that better lighting can have on creating brighter learning environments."

The USGBC is perhaps best known for its LEED (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design) program that recognizes building owners for green practices in areas ranging from energy use to wastewater treatment. LED-based lighting has been critical in reducing energy consumption in many LEED-recognized buildings such as a children's medical center in Austin, TX.