Electrical – draw power from nearby recessed lighting for pendant lights

electricalrecessed-lighting

I want to add two pendant lights above my island where I have a bunch of recessed lighting. Can I draw power from them in order to power the chandeliers?

I'm considering an Insteon solution in order to control the two separately, but that's another matter.

Best Answer

You'd have to calculate the load of the circuit to determine if you have enough capacity.

Volts x Amps = Watts

So if you are in the US, you probably have a 15 amp circuit which should only be loaded up to 12 amps. Now go add up everything else on that circuit. Lets say you have 10 pot lights at 50watts each.

120v x Yamps = 500watts

= 4.1amps

Now lets say your two lights are 100W each, that's another 1.67 amps (200W/120V), so 5.7 amps total being drawn which means you would be able to add these without overloading the circuit.

If the circuit was already approaching 12amps, you would not have enough capacity and would need to run a new circuit.

Related Topic