Energy saving controller for fluorescent lamps

Although fluorescent lamp is a very efficient lighting device in daily life, still the high harmonic distortion and low power factor cause unnecessary energy consumption. In today’s environment demanding energy efficiency, it is important to reduce this energy loss by integrating an energy saving controller in the electromagnetic ballast of fluorescent lamps. The research presented in this thesis investigates the design and implementation of a new energy saving controller for electromagnetic fluorescent lamp network. The newly developed controller attempts to reduce power losses in both the electromagnetic ballasts and fluorescent lamps by regulating the incoming supply voltage to an optimum level. In addition, the new controller is able to adjust the illuminance level of working environment lightings under either dark or bright condition. Moreover, the function of the new controller is extended with time scheduling control capability, where the switching of lighting systems can be controlled at predetermined times based on occupancy schedule. Both simulation and practical results show that the implemented controller reduces energy consumption by at least 37.5%, by reducing the incoming supply voltage by 15%. In addition, it is desirable to have variable illuminance level control to decrease the energy losses. The experimental results show that the illuminance output level of electromagnetic ballast fluorescent lamps can be decreased by 50% using the new controller while maintaining unity power factor. Integration of the new energy saving controller into electromagnetic ballast fluorescent lamps impressively outperforms the existing electronic dimmable ballast. This new controller brings great ideas for energy saving in the use of fluorescent lamps

A review and classification of LED ballasts

This paper presents a review on existing ballasts for light-emitting diodes (LED) with considerations to their compliance to regulations, technological challenges, and on meeting various application requirements. All existing LED ballasts, including those proposed in recent literature, have been appropriately classified and systematically organized for the discussion. The dissemination of this information and its understanding is helpful for future R&D pursuits in this area. © 2013 IEEE.published_or_final_versio

A dimmable light-emitting diode (LED) driver with mag-amp postregulators for multistring applications

Current imbalance should be avoided when multiple LED strings are connected in parallel. In this paper, a dimmable LED driver with magnetic-amplifier postregulators for multistring applications is presented. Powered by a common master source, parallel LED strings are individually regulated by their corresponding adaptive slave sources for current balancing in this proposal. Without linear current regulators, the proposed driver offers relatively high efficiency. Its structure is simpler than multiconverter structures for red, blue, and green LED applications, and is particularly suitable for LEDs with wide parameter variations. The performance of the proposed driver is experimentally verified by a 16.5-W prototype with a load of three 5.5-W LED strings. © 2006 IEEE.published_or_final_versio

Power source electronic ballast for electrodeless fluorescent lamps

This paper presents the design, control strategy and experimental results of a two-step, power factor correction stage (PFC) and resonant inverter (RI), electronic ballast proposal to supply 150 W electrodeless fluorescent lamps (EFL). The PFC acts as a controlled power source and provides mid and long-term stability to the system, while the stability of the current through the lamp is achieved with the RI. In addition, the power-mode control requires limitation of the output voltage. The dual operation mode of the PFC (voltage source mode and power source mode) enables an e cient soft resonant ignition and the implementation of simple dimming regulation.This work has been supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation and the EU through the projects CICYT-FEDER-TEC2014-52316-R: “Estimation and Optimal Control for Energy Conversion with Digital Devices, ECOTRENDD” and RTI2018-095138-B-C31 PEGIA: “Power Electronics for the Grid and Industry Applications”