Royal Albert Docks (RAD) is a waterfront community in East London that comprises 4.7 million sq. ft of office, residential, retail and leisure amenities.

With such a diverse mix of facilities and people using them, it’s essential that the emergency lighting, which is installed to provide illumination if the normal lighting system fails, is highly efficient. In addition, to achieve and maintain its BREEAM excellent certification, which demonstrates buildings’ sustainability performance, the chosen lighting fittings and controls needed to be environmentally friendly.

Multiplex the leading global construction company responsible for delivering RAD, commissioned built environment consultants Hilson Moran to specify an appropriate lighting design and product proposal for installation by engineering contractor Mercury. Hilson Moran approached NVC to work with them on the lighting design and supply thousands of products.

NVC’s in-house lighting design specialists developed a solution that included 6,500 emergency fittings based on STERLING IP44, 600 x 600 side-lit panels that were adapted to facilitate RAD’s air handling system. The STERLING fittings were fitted with Lithium batteries for improved performance and environmental sustainability and, at the time this was the largest emergency lighting system incorporating lithium technology that had been installed in the UK.

The system is controlled by DALI, the 2-way communications protocol that provides control over, and communication between, the components in a lighting system for ultimate performance and flexibility.

And to facilitate more efficient on-site installation NVC’s in-house assembly team manufactured luminaires with pre-wired plug and lead assemblies that connected to the existing busbars system so that their fittings could be connected more easily and quickly.

NVC’s project manager Michael Mulhall says: “This was a challenging project that brought together the many skills of our UK operation including design, assembly, technical support and logistics. We were very proud to be involved in an essential part of this prestigious development.”