Lighting – Does always-on safety lighting need a switch or other requirement

lightingnec

With such low-power LED lights available, I've been setting up some of my lighting to simply be on all the time, 24×7, e.g. 1 of 6 downlights or 1 out of 4 LED "tube"s in a troffer. Usually I just establish the convention of leaving the switch on. However I'd like to re-task those switches to other purposes, and simply hardwire the light into always-hot.

What does the National Electrical Code say about that? Does it require a switch so the light can be turned off easily by people in the room? Does it suffice that there's a circuit breaker in the panel? Does the light need to be marked with which breaker operates it? Is there a serious user-interface/usability issue with lights that can't be turned off? Is there anything I'm missing?

Best Answer

There's no code problem having a light on 24 hrs and switched at the breaker, but the breaker must be switch rated. Most new breakers are rated as such. You can check on one side of the breaker there will be a circle with the letters SWD stamped inside of it.