Gateway report and Round 7 CALiPER results released by DOE

[Erik Sine]

Gateway report and Round 7 CALiPER results released by DOE

24 Mar 2009

A report on LED parking-lot lighting has been released along with detailed Round 7 CALiPER test results. The DOE is also looking at stress testing of LED-based integral lamps.

GATEWAY report on LED parking lot lighting demo

The US Department of Energy (DOE) has published the report from a demonstration of bi-level LED parking lot lighting at a Raley's Supermarket in West Sacramento, California.

This GATEWAY demonstration report, prepared by Pacific Gas & Electric and Energy Solutions, provides an overview of project results including lighting performance, economic performance, and potential energy savings.

In this project, several metal halide (MH) luminaires in the Raley's parking lot were replaced with new LED luminaires from BetaLED incorporating bi-level operation (dim state and full state) controlled by motion detectors.

Key findings:

• The LED luminaires drew an average of 149 W on high power and 52 W on low power, versus 346 W for the MH luminaires, yielding a time-averaged annual energy savings estimate approaching 70%.

• LED luminaires on both “high” and “low” output delivered improved lighting uniformity over the MH baseline.

• Calculated simple payback periods for bi-level operation LEDs for both new construction and retrofit scenarios were less than five years.

Results from Round 7 of CALiPER testing

The US DOE has completed Round 7 of product testing through its Solid-State Lighting (SSL) CALiPER Program. Round 7 detailed test results - covering outdoor lighting, downlights, and replacement lamps - are now available for download through the searchable online CALiPER system.

The Department allows detailed test results from CALiPER testing to be distributed in the public interest for noncommercial, educational purposes only. A Summary Report containing the results from Round 7 is also available on the DOE SSL website.

Pre-qualification statements for stress testing

The US DOE has also requested capability statements for the purpose of pre-qualifying research facilities and/or testing laboratories for developing and conducting stress testing of LED-based integral lamps.

Qualified organizations will develop and perform various test procedures designed to assess performance of specific LED integral lamp products under a range of operating conditions, and to identify failure modes and reduced performance induced by those conditions.

Both catastrophic failure and diminished performance (light output, noticeable color shifts, and changes in luminous intensity distribution) are to be considered.

Stress testing will be conducted to support DOE Solid-State Lighting program activities related to CALiPER testing and the L Prize™competition. Entries for the L Prize competition must meet stringent performance requirements and undergo rigorous photometric, lifetime, and stress testing before the winners are declared.

To view the Pre-Qualification Announcement, visit http://www.ssl.energy.gov.

DOE REPORT

caliper_round_7_summary_final.pdf

[YYZ]

I had a look at that report last night.

The big thing that stood out to me was the streetlights. The SSL (LED) fixtures performed extremely well compared to HPS fixtures. With even a 3rd of the powr an measured lumens, they actually appear brighter and cleaner than HPS simply because of color temperature. The visual acuity of the human eye is much better at color temperatures in the 5~7K range, which LEDs fall nicely into - everything looks brighter and sharper even with considerably less measured light.

Works great for outdoors, but products have to be much warmer for indoors. The replacement lamps (many from offshore) still fall short in many ways as CALiPER proves. We've been toying with this for 3 years and still don't have something we feel is adequate to tool up and release to the market at the right price for mass use.

Manuel - are you aware of any Permlight stuff being used in the downlight testing here?