Batten lighting usually involves bar or box enclosures being suspended high overhead, forming a robust housing that's often most associated with tube lights - indeed, ceiling batten lighting was almost synonymous with the use of fluorescent strips for decades in most types of public and industrial spaces.

With the advancements in modern lighting technologies, however, more economical and hardwearing LED battens are rapidly becoming far more popular and widespread in many areas today.

What are the benefits of LED battens over traditional fluorescent tube fittings?

• LED battens run at far lower temperatures. Not only is this safer for anyone who might come into direct physical contact with batten enclosures, it also makes LED battens vastly more economical
• More than 90% of the energy an LED batten light consumes will converted directly to light output, and not wasted as unwanted heat
• LED battens are instant-on. Anyone who has spent any time around traditional fluorescent tube strips will be very familiar with their annoying tendency to flicker and blink for several seconds while trying to warm themselves up to full power
• This is one reason why standard tube battens are fairly useless in motion sensor/PIR applications, and most other types of security lighting. LEDs can instantly emit their full brightness when powered, making LED batten lights a great option for security and motion-triggered lights
• LED battens can emit highly directional light, not just flooding. LEDs are mounted in batten fixtures such that they focus all their light output at precisely the area you want to illuminate (i.e. the ground directly beneath them).
• With standard tube lights, their output is scattered at 360 degrees all around the circumference of the tube (which is why you often see them using built-in reflectors) - any light fired up towards the ceiling is essentially wasted energy, and thus money

LED batten lighting tends to be the preferred method of ceiling light installation in many modern industrial or high-traffic public areas, due to its handy utilitarian combination of convenience, ruggedness, economy and safety.