Overnight carpark lighting wastage

Klang Valley condo and office carparks often stay at full brightness after midnight because basement and covered decks have little daylight, and timers treat empty aisles like a busy evening. Occupancy-aware lighting dims those empty aisles. It does not take 20% off the whole TNB bill.

Why are the lights still on after midnight?

Walk a covered deck after the last visitor has left and the fittings are often still at full output. The usual reasons are ordinary, not a single broken switch.

• Basements and covered decks do not get a useful daylight off-switch. The lighting load is a day load and a night load.
• A coarse timer or a group circuit drops whole zones together. An empty aisle in that zone stays with the busy one.
• “Leave it bright so it feels safe” keeps the high output on when almost no car is moving. Dark pockets, when they exist, usually come from the grouping, not from a lack of fittings.

Open decks are a different pattern. Daylight and empty hours do not match a basement. That split is basement decks and open carparks.

What does occupancy-aware lighting change?

Carpark Light distributes Anyi Smart fittings. The fittings use a chipset, Bluetooth mesh, and a gateway so they can dim together when a bay or aisle is not in use, and rise when people or cars are there. The change is on the lighting load. Lifts and pumps on the same common-area bill are untouched.

A usable baseline stays. The intent is not a dark deck and not an off switch. The same account of the fittings is on the solution page. Committees who ask about darkness should read does dimming leave the carpark dark.

How is this different from a timer or a lamp swap?

A timer moves a group on the clock. A lamp swap can lower the watts of a fitting that still runs at full output all night. Neither one, by itself, answers an empty bay at 2am. The three jobs are separated in sensors, timers, or an LED retrofit.

What does a midnight walk actually prove?

It proves the fittings are still at high output when the deck is quiet. Count aisles that have no moving car, not the whole building. A bright ramp that residents still use is not the same as a storage row that has been empty since 11pm. Write down which one you saw.

It does not prove the common-area bill, the tariff, or the lift load. It does not prove a percentage. Two committees can see the same bright basement and still have different lighting slices, because one basement is a small share of a large account and the other is most of the overnight load. The walk is a reason to survey. It is not the survey.

What should maintenance be asked, separately?

Ask how often failed lamps are replaced, and whether patrols are looking for dark fittings or only for complaints. That cost is real and it belongs in a maintenance note. Do not add it to the lighting-energy band and call the sum a saving. A lamp that has failed is already off. A lamp at full output in an empty aisle is the energy question.

Also ask whether “safety” has been defined as full output on every fitting until morning. If that is the house rule, say so. Occupancy-aware dimming is a change to that rule: a baseline stays, and output rises when the aisle is used. It is not a promise that the aisle looks the same at 3am as it does at 8pm.

What can you not read off the overnight walk?

A bright deck at midnight shows that full output is still being used. It does not show the whole-building percentage. For a typical condo the public estimate is up to about 20% of lighting-related electricity. Office is about 15%. Mall is about 5%, because those carparks stay in use later. All three are estimate only, not a quotation. The condo reading is condo carpark electricity for JMB / MC.

Maintenance patrols that only replace failed lamps will still find failed lamps. That spend is real. It is not the same number as energy left running in an empty aisle. A site survey is required before any of this is a proposal for your building.