Case Study

Dartmouth Tackles Challenging Lighting Retrofit

at Leverone Field House
Deployment Saves 482,000 kWh per Year and
Achieves NCAA-Recommended Illumination Levels
Established in 1769 and located in Hanover, New Hampshire, Dartmouth College
(Dartmouth) is the nation’s ninth oldest university and one of eight Ivy League schools.
Well known for its student athletes, the university’s 34 varsity sports teams, known
as “The Big Green,” compete in NCAA Division I athletics, the Ivy League conference, LOCATION
and the Eastern Collegiate Athletic Conference (ECAC). The majority of Dartmouth HANOVER, NH
undergraduates also participate in some form of athletics, supported by 34 club and
FACILITY SIZE
24 intramural sports groups.
91,000 ft 2
An important part of the supporting infrastructure for its college athletics programs,
Dartmouth’s recently renovated Leverone Field House is a 91,000-square foot facility CEILING HEIGHT
with a high arching roof, 60-foot ceilings, and more than two acres of interior space. 60 ft
It houses an indoor track, multi-use practice area, and weight room. Almost continuously
in use, it serves as the main athletic facility for numerous varsity, club, and intramural ENVIRONMENT
teams during the winter months, and as an indoor space for many summer camp COLLEGIATE ATHLETIC FACILITY
programs that operate on the campus.
TEMPERATURE
SOLVING LIGHTING CHALLENGES WITH INTELLIGENT LEDS AMBIENT
Historically, lighting sports complexes and arenas with traditional metal halide or EXISTING LIGHTING SOLUTION
fluorescent fixtures posed many challenges for facility managers — challenges that 1,000W METAL HALIDE FIXTURES
the team at Leverone Field House were determined to solve with its planned lighting
retrofit. To evaluate their lighting options, they reached out to Leading Edge Design ANNUAL ENERGY SAVINGS
Group, an energy services firm that provides turnkey, vendor-neutral solutions for 75%
LED lighting and wireless lighting control technologies. After considering the alternatives,
Leading Edge Design Group recommended the Intelligent Lighting System from Digital PARTNER
Lumens, which: LEADING EDGE DESIGN GROUP
• Reduced lighting-related energy use dramatically, with projected savings
of 75%;
• Achieved NCAA-recommended light levels (70 foot candles) for officially
sanctioned sporting events on all event surfaces;
• Eliminated maintenance costs associated with frequent re-lamping and
re-ballasting in an extremely challenging space due to the vaulted ceiling
heights and synthetic turf surfaces that require specific protection for heavy
equipment needed for this maintenance;
• Facilitated the submission and approval process with Liberty Utilities, helping
Dartmouth earn an incentive totaling 35% of the total project cost;

“From an energy savings and sustainability perspective, the Digital Lumens system
was a highly visible success for our organization,” said Steve Shadford, P.E., LEED AP,
Energy Program Manager at Dartmouth College. “Yet, at the end of the day, the Figure 1: A standard LightRules report enables
real winners were the athletes themselves. Light quality is a critical component of Dartmouth's facility staff to rapidly view
a superior sporting experience, and the Intelligent Lighting System delivers. From occupancy and the daily energy use/cost.
athletes to event coordinators, athletics directors, and the university population-
at-large, it is a highly visible and talked about improvement that reflects well on the
university and varsity sports program.”
Leverone Fieldhouse at Dartmouth College
COMPLEX SPACES, COMPREHENSIVE SOLUTION
Prior to the Intelligent Lighting System retrofit, the Leverone
Field House was illuminated by 1000-Watt metal halide fixtures,
which provided minimal flexibility on how lighting was used
Figure 2: The 91,000-sq-ft collegiate athletic facility achieves
NCAA-recommended light levels of 70 foot candles on all event surfaces.
within the facility. During operating hours, roughly 6 a.m. to
midnight and frequently longer, lighting had to be left on 100%
of the time due to slow ramp-up times and cycling impacts on
maintenance schedules and budgets. Additionally, the facility’s
vaulted ceilings and open spaces made it challenging to deliver
adequate lighting to track and field surfaces, resulting in uneven
lighting, low foot candle readings, and high fixture counts.
The Digital Lumens solution, implemented by Leading Edge
Design Group, solved these challenges through its:
• Unique fixture design, which incorporates independently
rotatable and dimmable light bars within each fixture,
enabling light to be directed to where it needs to go
without over-lighting spaces or increasing fixture counts.
• Well-designed optics that distribute light over specific
pieces of equipment or across open track and field areas,
respectively.
• Fully integrated occupancy and daylight harvesting
sensors in every fixture, enabling lighting to turn on, off
or dim to save energy and take advantage of natural light.
• Integrated LightRules lighting management software,
providing extremely granular control over how lighting is
used throughout the facility.
“Dartmouth’s Leverone Field House is a complex, multi-
dimensional space, and we felt it required a comprehensive
lighting solution that could enhance the facility’s ability
to support its unique users and events,” said Jay Boucher,
Principal for Leading Edge Design Group. “After an extensive
design process that considered many alternatives, we felt the
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Case Study
Digital Lumens system helped Dartmouth improve flexibility
while maximizing energy savings and delivery of light.”
INTELLIGENCE IS THE KEY
As seasons change or a new school year begins, field house
schedules and usage patterns invariably change as well. In order
to manage how lighting is delivered within the Field House and
access critical decision-making data, facility personnel actively
leverage LightRules, the Digital Lumens’ integrated lighting
management software. LightRules provides the tools they
need to:
• Control fixture settings and behaviors, such as how long
lighting stays on after a space is unoccupied and/or light
level settings, down to the individual fixture level.
• Group lighting around specific pieces of equipment or
field surfaces, such as batting cages, infield or the outer
track, and manage their settings and behaviors.
• Create and name different lighting scenarios, such as
“Baseball Practice” or “NCAA Track and Field Events,”
enabling lighting to be quickly aligned with the specific
needs of a sporting activity or event, e.g., increasing
center field lighting intensity during baseball practice
while dimming unoccupied track surfaces, or vice versa.
• Learn more about how lighting is being used, such as
where activity is concentrated in the facility or when
peak usage occurs, through integrated reports that
document lighting use and energy savings by fixture, zone
or facility-wide for any timeframe needed.
• Develop an on-site touchscreen kiosk for coaches
and event managers. Using the LightRules application
programming interface (API), the touchscreen has a
range of profiles that map to the many uses of the site so
that anyone with login credentials can easily and securely
invoke lighting profiles for their specific uses, e.g., softball
practice, baseball practice, or reunion event.
“Through its comprehensive approach, the Digital Lumens
system greatly simplified our transition to energy-efficient
lighting,” continued Mr. Shadford. “In the process, we gained
an easily managed lighting system with the flexibility to meet
the needs of our athletes and staff, and that reflects well
on the college. A project’s success can be defined on many
levels — energy savings, ease of installation and support, light
quality, suitability to purpose, and maintenance — and on all
fronts, Leading Edge Design Group and Digital Lumens met
our expectations.”
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Subject to change without notice.
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