Understanding Improvements to HID Lighting Technology
San Jose, California (PRWEB) March 13, 2015 -- For the past 15 years, metal-halide lamps have been the dominant high-intensity discharge (HID) lamp technology for several commercial applications. Newer lighting technologies such as LED and induction have been introduced in an attempt to replace HID lamp tech, and are typically marketed as superior solutions. However, with recent improvements in HID lamp and ballast technologies, HID remains the best performing lighting solution available.
Newly introduced HID innovations include:
➢ The ceramic metal-halide (CMH) lamp, which replaces the quartz arc envelope material used in traditional metal-halide lamps with a ceramic. The ceramic allows the use of higher performing halides that would quickly deteriorate a quartz envelope.
➢ Electronic ballast technology, which greatly increase the lamp lifetime and lumen output.
Recently, these improvements have led to 120 lm/watt systems with a 90+ color rendering index, up to 100,000 hours of life, and colors/temperature of 3000k and 4200k. Energy consumption is typically reduced by 50%, yet that number may rise as high as 75% when taking advantage of dynamic management such as dimming functions.
Performance considerations such as lamp life are closely tied to ballast technology. Traditional magnetic ballasts (commonly paired with metal-halide lamps) have no “smarts” in them. In order to ignite an HID lamp, they emit a 4kV strike of energy, causing electrodes to be jolted and damaging the arc envelope. With ”smart” electronic ballasts it is possible to virtually eliminate this contribution to lamp failure. Global Energy & Lighting’s CeramaTek and QuartzTek ballasts use a narrow train of pulses that are additive to create a soft 4kV strike, and with a computer control are able to immediately lower the voltage as soon as ignition of the lamp is confirmed.
One metric that isn’t fully understood by the layman, but is of great importance to the lighting designer, is lamp lumen depreciation. The light/lumen output of a lamp is always higher when the lamp is new; over time, the lamp outputs less and less light. In fact, since LED lamps don’t fail, an LED’s lifetime is determined specifically by when the light output is 70% of its initial output. This metric is important because each lamp model has its own specific depreciation curve, i.e. a graph showing how each lamp depreciates, or loses light/lumen output, overtime.
Limiting lamp depreciation is an excellent way to lower the wattage requirements of lamps used in specific areas. In the 1,000W metal-halide example, the lighting designer will design the space based on 60,000 mean lumens. However, if a QuartzTek 575W lamp with 60,000 initial lumens is deployed, lamp depreciation can be limited to 5%, with the mean lumens of the lamp being 57,000. During the early part of its life, the 1000W lamp would be brighter than the 575W lamp, but this extra light was never designed to be in the space. During the second half of the lamp’s life, the 575W lamp will be brighter than the 1,000W; with the 1000W providing insufficient light while the 575W maintains the proper level.
Coupling the latest in HID ballast technology with the latest in HID lamp technology, such as ceramic metal-halide, enables a new standard of lighting solutions with unbeatable performance characteristics. With HID lamps being continually improved, it is questionable whether any newer technologies will be performance-competitive, and price competitive, in the foreseeable future.
About Global Energy & Lighting
Global Energy & Lighting manufactures and distributes cost-effective, energy-efficient commercial lighting solutions. The executive team is headquartered in Eagle, Idaho, R&D in San Jose, and international sales offices located in Eastern and Western Asia. The company also looks to outside consultants to further ensure the integrity of its products.
Grant Stephens, Global Energy & Lighting, http://www.gel-usa.com/, +1 408-418-4627, [email protected]
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