LED vs Metal Halide Lighting: 7 Reasons LED Wins

We all understand or at least heard that converting from Metal-Halide (High Intensity Discharge) to LED will help you save money.

What are the difference you or other reasons ought to know about?

In this post, we break down all the variables which you should be conscious of before making a decision to convert from Metal-Halide to LED. Here are the 9 reasons we think Metal-Halide is won over by LED.

1. Lamp (Source) Efficiency Vs Fixture (System) Efficiency

Let’s take a peek at the info on a typical 400 watt metal halide bulb. While specifications may vary, a visit to some popular online website that sells Metal-Halide bulbs reveals that a brand new lightbulb has the following specifications:

First Lumens: 32,000 to 36,000

Life Hours: 20,000

A recent white paper by the Dark Skies Society rated the mean lumens for a 400W Metal-Halide to be 20,500 lm and the rated life expectancy to be around 15,000 hours. But for purposes of this discussion, we will stick with the numbers we are familiar with.

There is a lot of interesting information to look at. First lumens is an amount that is high, but in reality, a Metal-Halide bulb starts off quite glowing and then drops its lm quite fast, settling in at a lower lumen output signal rather fast. It is common to lose as much as 20% in the first 6 months. So while 36,000 lm sounds impressive, within 6 months, it can be below 30,000 lumens. Lumen depreciation in a metal halide bulb is relatively rapid. A Metal Halide bulb is omni directional. That means light is spread in every way. As much lighting fixture parallel to the earth as it does facing downwards so it generates. To make this light useful, you need to assemble it, assemble it, and deliver it to where you want it. The main problem with reflected light is how powerful is the reflector getting the light that bounces off of it to the ground. A lumen that bounces back into the fixture and bounces off the reflector is considered a decline lumen. Is throw away. Greater of the lighting fixture or as much as 30% can be lost in this bounce that was reflective. So if we assume the initial lumens of the lamp at 36,000, if we do the math of a metal halide bulb in a high-bay fixture lumens, after 6 months we'd anticipate the fixture effective lumen efficacy to be:

36,000 lumens – 20% (initial lumen loss) = 28,800 lumens

Lumens decrease from reflector bounce: 8,640

Total lumens after 6 months in High-Bay fixture: 20,160

This does not take into account any lenses or shields the fixture might have. Keep in mind, this is lightbulb lumens, not fixture lumens, so anything else added that gets in the way of getting lighting fixture to the ground will always take from powerful lm.

Compare this to LED. If you consider a fixture, like a LED high-bay, or a Led Retro Kit that replaces the Metal Halide pieces, all the light is directional, in that, it's directed to where it really is needed. Reflectors are not demanded. There's nothing . In LED, it does happen with regards to lumen depreciation, but it takes a lot longer for it to happen. So where as Metal-Halide loses lots of lm in the first 6 months of life, for a lot more LED tends to maintain its lm.

But there’s more to this story, read below…

2. Operating Life

Bigger bulbs, like a 1000 watt Metal Halide, are around 15,000 hours. One way is to mention L70. L70 is not a measurement of end of life, but it's a measurement of lumen degradation up to 70% of initial lm. This does not mean ballast or the driver another part might fail.

So while not dead, exceptionally unsuccessful. For the record, 400 watts is still consumed by it even though it truly is half as bright.

3. Efficiency (lumens/watt)

That is the harbinger to the following matter, energy savings, but the fundamental premise is the more efficient the bulb is, the additional money you will save. So let’s compute the lumen efficacy of metal-halide versus LED.

To compute lumen efficacy, you must take the total lm generated and divide it by the absolute watts used up. In the case of Metal Halide, you also need to include ballast draw. It is around 455 watts if you recorded the absolute watts consumed of a 400W lightbulb that is typical.

So computing lumen efficacy for metal halide: 36,000 lumens / 455 watts = 79.12 lumens/watt.

Let’s compare that with our 150 watt Led Replacement Kit: 23,250 lumens / 150 watts = 155 lm/watt. Nearly double of Metal-Halide.

And remember the golden rule: Efficiency Saves Money!

4. Energy Savings

Sp in the preceding discussion, something significant was pointed out. Above we talked about the mean lm of a 400W Metal Halide to be around 20,500 lumens. Our 150W retrofit kit produces 23,250 lm, but instead of burning 455 watts, it uses up watts. is consumed by just That represents a 66% savings in energy consumed to produce more lighting fixture. But the truth of the matter, we think 23,250 lumens to replace 400W Metal-Halide is over kill. For years, we've been selling our 105W led replacement Kit and it efficient replacing, the 100W LED retrofit kit at over 15,000 lm to replace 400W Metal Halide. Here is a recent example of a trial a customer did to make sure the lumen output of our 105W clothing would not be as bad as what he was now using.

Retro111

5. Savings on Maintenance

As they do for energy savings we've just as many customers needing to convert to LED because of maintenance savings. The higher the installation stature, the higher the expense of replacement. And if you've a facility loaded with lights, this becomes a budget amount that is significant every year you have to consider. Like repairing the machines that make the company money on replacing bulbs that cost the business money, yet, these folks will have time to work on things that matter.

6. Quality of Light

It reads lumens when you take a measurement of light with a light meter. And this measurement of the bulbs that contribute to the light at that place creates a measurement called foot candles. But let’s think about that lighting fixture that is certainly being measured. Metal-Halide creates all kinds in all spectrum’s, of lighting fixture, visible or otherwise. This includes IR and UV spectrum’s, visible to the measuring device but not observable to the human eye. LED, on the other hand, doesn't generate IR and UV. Hence, its readings using precisely the same lighting fixture meter is only picking spectrum’s that is visible up.

One is called Color Rendering Index, or CRI. It truly is a measurement of Quality of Lighting Fixture. It’s a scale between 100 and 0, 100 is superb. And LED tends to have CRI value that is high. So another golden rule we say is “ when you have more quality” You need amount that is less. Now, Metal-Halide bulbs are definitely not much worse than their High-Pressure Sodium counterparts, and can not be bad. But so we perceive the lighting fixture generated by LED to be more glowing LED tends to be a good deal better. More about this in the following section.

So there's an interesting little test you can do. Have 2 light sources, LED and Metal Halide. And first inquire, which one is more glowing? And if the right LED source was chosen, LED should be said by them. And then use a light meter, and the light meter may say more foot candles are being produced by the Metal Halide region.

7. Photopic vs Scotopic Lm

Several years ago the discussion of photopic vs scotopic lm was perceived as voodoo magic conversation. There were those who believed in many who discounted it and the difference. It's accurate individuals are able to see, and light is a large part of why we're able to see. Walk into a shadowy bat cave and you'll instantly realize how important lighting fixture is. Our eyes consist of rods and cones, and they work permits us to see colours and perceive things at night. You will notice that it is more difficult to see colours in the dark. Lighting fixture meters and cameras work differently, they find lighting fixture in an entirely different way, but what they do read they register and they interpret what it is reading’ that is ‘.

Then scientists and physicists came along and they attempted to make sense of all this. And they came up with this theory of scotopic lumens. But then they took it a step farther and decided to create a series of factors by light source of how lights really look scotopically versus how a lighting fixture is measured photopically. What came out was a number of factors between 3 and 0. Some lighting fixture sources lm that were effective were reduced by these factors, like High-Pressure Sodium. Some lighting fixture sources were raised by these factors, like LED. What was determined was the variable connected with LED was higher than Metal Halide. So in the discussion above about light that is sensed, it helps to understand why we believe LED Lights are brighter than other light sources, though the lighting fixture meter tells us differently.