IN Brief:
- Revised EU building rules require automatic lighting controls in larger non residential properties.
- Thresholds move from systems above 290kW by the end of 2027 to above 70kW by the end of 2029.
- Lighting is becoming part of wider building data architecture through occupancy sensing, zoning, and interoperable controls.
Revised European building efficiency rules are accelerating the adoption of automatic lighting controls, occupancy sensing, and connected building management interfaces across non residential properties.
The recast Energy Performance of Buildings Directive requires suitably zoned automatic lighting controls where heating, air conditioning, or combined building systems exceed 290kW. That requirement applies by 31 December 2027, before the threshold falls to 70kW by 31 December 2029.
As the lower threshold enters force, a much larger section of commercial and public building stock will require automatic control. Systems must detect occupancy within the relevant zone, shifting lighting design away from central time schedules and towards more granular sensing and local response.
Signify has outlined how the rules will extend demand for connected lighting, building management integration, and occupancy data. The directive remains technology neutral, leaving designers to select wired, wireless, or hybrid architectures capable of meeting the required function throughout the building’s operating life.
Lighting controls have often been specified as a self contained installation, even when they share the same rooms and occupancy patterns as heating, ventilation, access control, and space management. The revised requirements push lighting further into the building’s digital infrastructure, where data from one sensor network may inform several services.
That convergence can reduce duplicated equipment, although it raises the cost of poor interoperability. DALI and DALI-2 provide a common route for addressing luminaires, drivers, and input devices, while BACnet and other building automation protocols carry information between the lighting layer and supervisory systems.
Gateways must translate those interfaces without losing device status, zone structure, alarm information, or commissioning data. Cybersecurity also becomes part of the lighting design, since a connected control network may provide a route into wider operational systems if credentials, updates, and remote access are not managed.
Existing buildings will present the greater engineering challenge. New projects can coordinate sensor locations, communications cabling, control zones, and commissioning from the design stage, whereas retrofit work has to accommodate legacy luminaires, incomplete records, changing layouts, occupied rooms, and equipment from several generations of control technology.
Legrand’s expanded electronics manufacturing operation in Cramlington includes intelligent building controls and connected electrical infrastructure. The EPBD timetable adds a regulatory driver to that market, bringing more control equipment, gateways, sensors, and commissioning tools into planned building upgrades.
Occupancy detection involves several competing technologies. Passive infrared sensors are economical and widely understood, but they depend on movement and line of sight; microwave and radar based devices can detect finer motion, although they may trigger beyond the intended zone or require more careful configuration.
Camera based systems offer richer occupancy information, yet they introduce privacy, processing, storage, and network requirements. Sensor choice must therefore follow the room geometry, expected activity, mounting position, and acceptable data policy rather than a single building wide specification.
Commissioning will determine whether the energy reduction appears in practice. Poorly defined zones, excessive time outs, misplaced sensors, and confusing manual overrides can leave lights operating unnecessarily or produce disruptive switching that occupants defeat through local workarounds.
Connected systems can expose those faults through trend data and device diagnostics, provided the information remains accessible after handover. Facilities teams need the credentials, software, documentation, and skills required to alter zones as layouts change and to replace failed equipment without rebuilding the complete control scheme.
Luminaires may remain installed for well over a decade, while gateways, wireless standards, cloud services, and cybersecurity expectations change much faster. Open interfaces, local fallback behaviour, and exportable configuration data can reduce dependence on one service provider, but those capabilities must be specified before procurement.
The move to a 70kW threshold will bring medium sized offices, schools, healthcare buildings, retail sites, and public facilities into a more demanding controls environment. Lighting electronics will increasingly be judged as part of a wider building system, with reliability determined by sensors, gateways, commissioning, security, and long term support rather than the luminaire alone.
