Knowledge Centre

HOW THE HANDBOOK CAME ABOUT

Every high-quality product begins with a vision and passion arising from market needs and anticipating how the market will develop in the future. That is how this Handbook came into being. We looked beyond our country's borders, studied regulations in Western countries and translated them ourselves so that we could learn more and put that knowledge to use in our projects. Month after month, our information grew as standards changed, technology developed and our understanding of safety systems improved. We wanted to pass this acquired knowledge on to the market, so we began running training courses on standards and emergency lighting design at the training centre established at our company's headquarters.

The next logical step was to bring together all the information we had collected and translated in one place — the Emergency Lighting Handbook. Our intention was to make it entirely transparent, free of commercial bias and based on the latest applicable standards and regulations in Croatia, Austria and Germany (German-speaking countries that have developed the most detailed rules in the field of emergency lighting). Every piece of information in this Handbook has a clearly stated, verifiable source. We also wanted to provide the market with clear, comprehensible information in Croatian about current regulations and standards and, through the Handbook, establish a common basis for discussing this topic.

We believe we achieved this in this edition and that subsequent editions will be even better.

Respectfully, Zoran Čovran

“Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the passing on of fire.”

WHO WE ARE

sibeling d.o.o. was founded in 2022 with the aim of offering the market high-quality solutions supported by expertise in a very important but often neglected area — emergency lighting. We built our experience over many years of market activity, from design and sales to support during installation. We are part of a positive change and focus on solving problems. We believe that our knowledge, investments in professional development and in the company itself can help raise standards and awareness of this aspect of every project. We want to be a centre of knowledge, professionalism and expertise in emergency lighting. Emergency lighting is what we do.

To remain relevant in the markets where we operate, we continue to develop our expertise, participate in projects from the design stage, are present on site during implementation and return for maintenance and servicing. We love what we do.

EMERGENCY LIGHTING

EMERGENCY LIGHTING

Emergency lighting is intended for use when the normal lighting power supply fails and is therefore supplied from a source independent of the one powering normal lighting. For the purposes of this Handbook, emergency lighting is a generic term encompassing several specific forms, as shown in Figure 2.

STANDBY LIGHTING

EMERGENCY ESCAPE LIGHTING

ESCAPE ROUTE LIGHTING

OPEN AREA (ANTI-PANIC) LIGHTING

HIGH-RISK TASK AREA LIGHTING

SAFETY SIGNS

DYNAMIC SAFETY SIGNS

Figure 2: Classification of emergency lighting according to HRN EN 1838:2025.

EMERGENCY LIGHTING

EMERGENCY ESCAPE LIGHTING

STANDBY LIGHTING

(emergency lighting)

(emergency escape lighting)

(standby lighting)

Lighting that permits the safe evacuation of people from a building in the event of a failure of mains power to the normal lighting system and also allows high-risk activities in hazardous areas to be terminated safely. It is divided into standby lighting and emergency escape lighting.

The part of emergency lighting whose function is to provide direction and sufficient illumination so that people can evacuate safely from the building or reach a safe place within it. It also enables high-risk activities to be stopped safely so as to prevent additional accidents.

The part of emergency lighting that allows activities to continue without interruption when mains power fails (for example, a basketball game or a performance) by switching to backup power sources (generators, UPS, etc.). Under HRN EN 1838, standby lighting is classed as emergency lighting, but it does not perform a safety function and is not mandatory by law.

ESCAPE ROUTE LIGHTING

HIGH-RISK TASK AREA LIGHTING

ADAPTIVE (DYNAMIC) EMERGENCY ESCAPE LIGHTING

OPEN AREA (ANTI-PANIC) LIGHTING

(escape route lighting)

(open area lighting)

(high-risk task area lighting)

The part of emergency escape lighting that indicates the correct direction of travel towards the building exit using safety signs (pictograms), provides the necessary illuminance of escape routes and allows fire-fighting and safety equipment to be found and used easily. It includes escape route lighting, illuminated safety signs and low-mounted directional markers.

Emergency lighting for large open areas is intended to reduce the likelihood of panic by providing adequate illumination and guiding people towards an escape route.

Adaptive lighting can supplement conventional emergency escape lighting and increase its effectiveness in emergencies. Such a system includes internally illuminated safety signs (pictograms) that can dynamically change the displayed information to indicate alternative escape routes or warn that a particular route is closed or temporarily unavailable.

The part of emergency lighting that enables the safe evacuation of people engaged in potentially hazardous processes and the termination of high-risk activities in hazardous areas, to prevent further accidents.