What are the recommended minimum lighting levels for your business?

The following table shows the recommended lighting levels for different work environments.

On your floor plan, mark up the current lighting levels, and the ones that are recommended for each area of your business.

This could tell you where you can save money by reducing your lighting levels. For example, the lighting levels in an office environment should be 320 lux, but in many businesses it is often higher. When that happens, the energy bill will be higher too.

LIGHTING LEVEL TABLE

Minimum Illuminance (Lux)	Task difficulty and examples
40	corridors walkways
80	change rooms loading bays toilets cleaners’ rooms locker rooms bulky storage internal stairs
160	Simple tasks general cafeteria area general kitchen area entrance halls bathing rooms lobbies foyers waiting rooms rough bench work general fabrication
240	Moderately easy tasks: food preparation areas training and seminar rooms photocopying medium woodworking
320	Moderately difficult tasks: normal office work meeting rooms
400	Moderately difficult tasks: fine woodwork
600	Difficult tasks: drawing boards laboratories inspection tasks fine machine work fine painting colour matching
800	Very difficult tasks: fine inspection tasks colour matching of dyes
1200	Extremely difficult tasks: graphic arts inspection extra fine bench work
1600	Exceptionally difficult tasks: Exceptionally difficult tasks: jewellery watch making

Footnotes

Table Extracted from Table 3.1 AS/NZS 1680.1:2006 – Interior and workplace lighting recommended maintenance illuminances for various tasks, activities or interiors
Adapted from: CitySwitch and Sustainability Victoria ‘The Lighting Design Hierarchy’

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BACK TO STEP 8: CUT YOUR LIGHTING BILLS

What are the recommended minimum lighting levels for your business?

LIGHTING LEVEL TABLE

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