By Joe Boomgaard | MiBiz
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HOLLAND — People like to have the security of a lighted parking garage at night, but leaving the lights on when no one is around or when the sun is shining can be a huge waste of energy.

TwistHDM, an affiliate of technology design firm Twisthink, believes it has a solution. It has developed a wireless technology to optimally manage the light fixtures in a parking garage, said Lee Eilers, president of the company.

The company’s LimeLight product uses wireless technology that can be remotely controlled and automatically programmed to match the conditions in a given location. The system needs only to be plugged in, and its sensors send data to a user interface that tracks energy use and can help determine a program allowing for the most efficiency in the system.

While wireless lighting is nothing new for indoor environments, making the leap outside sets TwistHDM apart, Eilers said.

“The secret sauce is our capabilities in an outdoor environment,” Eilers told MiBiz. “That’s where we’ve spent our time and technology to make it robust in that environment.”

Eilers and some others kicked around the idea for the company dating back to May 2008 and started writing a business plan and officially launching that October. The company’s first product launched May 2009 at a parking industry show in Denver. LimeLight’s first installation, a beta test, was at the Pearl Street parking facility owned by Ellis Parking Co. in Grand Rapids.

The technology uses a 111-watt fluorescent fixture that can be dimmed or turned off and rigged to a motion sensor when the full wattage is not needed.

“The beauty of the system is that it only needs to be wired to power,” said Pat Burel, director of customer service at TwistHDM. “We build a high-density mesh very much like the Internet.”

Each fixture is connected by a radio frequency to an Ethernet conduit, which in turn connects it to a computer loaded with software written and managed by TwistHDM. The computer gathers the information and sends it to the company’s user website, where they can remotely operate the lighting, set schedules or programs or monitor energy use.

“Every light could be autonomous,” Burel said. “There’s no need to rewire. It’s really just lighting control.”

That control allows companies operating the facilities to save money by not paying for the lights to be on for no reason. On a sunny day, the system at the Ellis lot can allow the lighting to operate at a cost of less than a dollar per hour — just $0.79 — for 310 fixtures on a six-level ramp, Eilers said. Using conservative estimates, he said companies could expect to see a pay back with the LimeLight system in three to four years.

“Those are 12-year fixtures,” he said, compared to typical metal halide ballasts rated for a 7-year life cycle. “If you think about it, the savings is incremental and cumulative over the life of the fixture.”

While there might be a concern about safety in a dark parking garage, Eilers and Burel said what LimeLight offers is an active, unpredictable system for ne’er-do-wells. The motion sensors allow the lights to turn on instantly at full power no matter the conditions, plus the connectivity of the system can alert managers to problems, like if a light has been vandalized.

“We take a static, predictable environment and make it dynamic,” Eilers said. “If someone knocks out a light to make it dark, that sends a message to the controller that a light is out.”

That information is also valuable so maintenance people aren’t wasting time driving around looking for burned out lights.

“We’re making it smarter for energy, for safety and for maintenance,” Burel said.

Since the initial beta installation, TwistHDM has sold the product to municipalities across the country, including Grand Rapids, Dearborn, Dubuque, Louisville and Baltimore County, Md., as well as to higher education institutions like Ohio State University, Pomona College in California, and University of Georgia.

A system will soon be installed at University of Michigan and at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colo. A residential facility in New Haven, Conn. installed the system and received a utility rebate in the process, said Eilers. The company is working through a nationwide network of 25 dealers to market LimeLight.

TwistHDM is also working with the City of Ann Arbor to test the company’s system on LED fixtures, which could be the next step for bulb technology.

“You can’t call a product innovative if it isn’t commercially viable. If it isn’t, it’s just an invention,” Eilers said. “We want to be known as the leader in wireless control applications for the outdoor environment. We’ve taken on the hardest application in a parking garage, and now we want to apply that to flat lots, which are larger than a parking garage. Take a flat lot where you have 400-watt fixtures blazing, and (it’s no surprise that) manufacturers said, ‘We want you to get into this space quickly.’ We’re pretty excited.”