AMERIKANA GREEN ENERGY
California firm's revolutionary financing plan
makes LED retrofits profitable for customers.
With Amerikana's Green Energy Lease Program, customers pay nothing up front and are
guaranteed immediate savings to retrofit a building with energy-efficient LED lighting.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
(Press Release) September 12, 2010
The one drawback to Amerikana Green Energy Chairman Gary Cox's proposal for installing
energy-efficient lighting is that at first glance it seems too good to be true.
His San Diego, CA., company retrofits buildings with state-of-the- art LED lighting with No Out
of Pocket Capital for the lights and installation, customers will receive money back immediately
through reduction of their lighting spend and utility bill.
The key is a creative financing plan, the Green Lease Program, which enables facility owners to
pay for energy-related upgrades through reduced utility/labor/material bills. With the Green
Lease plan, the customer pays nothing up front and is guaranteed savings
immediately. Amerikana Green Energy makes our fee from the Green Lease which is funded by
the energy savings. " You pay nothing in advance and get cash back to you bottom line from day
one," Cox said.
“We are offering a positive cash-flow contract. You pay nothing in advance and get cash back in
your pocket from Day One,” Cox said. “We can do this because we are not just replacing bulbs,
we are doing a custom redesign of your entire lighting system, and we are using the top
American made UL/DLC rated lamps and fixtures to do so. Most of the time buildings are not
lighted properly.”
Cox can walk into a building and immediately spot instances where energy is being wasted.
AGE takes a systematic approach, analyzing a building’s lighting needs based on factors such as
square footage of the area to be lighted, hours of operation and current energy use.
AMERIKANA GREEN ENERGY
The retrofit is tailored to the customer’s specific needs with American made, name brand
manufactures, UL/DLC rated, long-lasting, energy-efficient, environmentally- friendly LED
lamps and fixtures. The lights generate virtually no heat and last significantly longer than
incandescent, fluorescent and halogen bulbs, lowering air-conditioning and maintenance costs
along with wattage.
Energy savings varies with the facility. But LED lights have an average life of 50,000 to 100,000
hours, about 50 times longer than equivalent incandescent bulbs, and require 70 to 80 percent
less power. The energy-consuming ballast needed to regulate fluorescent fixtures is eliminated.
“The total energy saving is only one part of the savings that you see. The other part is through
reducing maintenance and labor costs,” Cox said.
Interest in LED lighting is growing due to increased emphasis on reducing greenhouse gas
emissions, energy conservation and advances in the technology. The Clinton Climate Initiative,
former President Bill Clinton’s foundation, is working with the city of Los Angeles to install
140,000 LEDs in a project that is forecast to give the city an energy savings of about 40 percent
and reduce carbon emissions by 40 tons per year. It is expected this will save the city $48 million
and reduce carbon emissions by 197,000 tons over a seven-year period.
Several universities have undertaken LED retrofits, notably Notre Dame, which reported energy
savings of 81 percent.
Among those solutions is to use of state-of-the- art sensors such as PIR, ultrasonic motion
detectors that intensify or dim the lights in a room or hallway according to traffic through the
area. That cannot be done with fluorescent lights, which are not dimmable without negative
effect.
Among other advantages of LEDs: They contain no hazardous mercury, cadmium or lead;
operate on low-voltage current; and emit no UV or ultraviolet rays, thus not attracting bugs or
dust and remaining maintenance free.
To draw a comparison, Cox holds up a 4-inch PL plug-in compact fluorescent tube, commonly
sold in home supply stores. It emits light in 360 degrees, but only half of it projects from the
fixture. Cox’s LED version of the same plug-in has light emitting diodes along one side,
eliminating the waste of energy.
“The [fluorescent] light is 13 watts, but it’s working with a ballast that is another 5 watts, so
you’re talking about 18 watts versus 4.5 to 6 with the LED,” he said.
AMERIKANA GREEN ENERGY
The difference becomes even starker when you compare the LED’s richer, truer quality of light,
void of annoying flicker and buzz.
“The difference is other types of lighting are mechanical, it’s based on gas in a tube or bulb. It’s
going to be very difficult to improve on at this point,” Cox said. “We’re putting high-technology
into creating innovative products, and it’s evolving quickly.”
Amerikana Green Energy can incorporate a variety of lighting panels and bulbs of various sizes
into its lighting solutions, available in an array of colors. Being very small, LEDs can be easily
integrated into all sorts of objects, furniture and architecture as colorful accents or hidden light
sources.
“We are offering the possibility for every company and facility in America to become energyefficient and green, to aid the environment, to save money and create jobs in their local
economy, and to create a more healthy lighting environment,” Cox said.
LED Lighting at No Out of Pocket Cost!