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There is typically a "wow" factor when a tenant moves into a brand-new building after years, or even decades, at a previous location. Everything's new, from the architectural design to the furniture to the technologies that make the new building more comfortable and convenient, all of which conspire to make the old location seem that much more antiquated.

That was the case for those who work at the Tallahassee, FL, branch of First American Title Insurance Co., which serves as the company's Southeast/Mid-Atlantic division headquarters, and counts among its business title searches, mortgage processing and background checks on job candidates. In September 2007, the branch moved eight miles across Tallahassee to a new 55,000-square-foot, three-floor building with amenities such as a large training room with stadium seating for educational seminars and meetings.

But according to facilities manager Marilyn Ferris, perhaps the most impressive feature is the various types of automatic lighting control that maximize both convenience and energy savings. The controls includes:

• A whole-building, schedule-based lighting control system that automatically turns on all exterior lights at dusk, and turns off all interior lights at 8 p.m.
• Extensive localized lighting control consisting of keypads that activate pre-set lighting scenes in selected areas of the building, like the training room, conference rooms and the main lobby, along with single-button override switches that allow employees working after 8 p.m. to activate lights for a two-hour period.
• Occupancy and light-level sensors that turn lights on and off automatically based on changing conditions, such as personnel entering or exiting a room, or the increase or decrease of natural light levels.

From Ferris' perspective, lighting control was a drastic — but welcome — change.

"In the old building, everything was traditional switches," she recalls. "There was no whole-building lighting control. The parking lot lights were on a timer, so we had to remember to adjust it for daylight-saving time. It wasn't as convenient. At the other building, people would leave the lights on, and I used to think, 'What a waste of energy.'"

But there is another big "wow" tied to the lighting control technologies at the building. Project particulars like Homer Ooten, president of consulting engineering firm Ooten and Associates, and Ben Turner, vice president of electrical contractor Weston Trawick Inc., both of Tallahassee, predict that energy use at the building related to lighting is up to 20 percent less compared to not using lighting control.

However, all those benefits might not have been realized without a change to the 2004 Florida Building Code for Buildings, and a shift to a distributed lighting control functionality for localized lighting control after the project began, which saved programming and installation time and allowed budget projections to be met.