Abstract
The purpose of the present paper is to evaluate the sensitivity of modern lighting technologies to different types of RVCs. In order to do that, 27 modern lamps—mainly LED—have been subjected to real RVCs and their response has been assessed. The detection of RVCs on the grid has been performed according to the IEC 61000-4-30 detection method, while the response of the lamps has been measured with a light flickermeter and characterized using the instantaneous flicker perception, as defined in IEC 61000-4-15. The obtained results show a high dispersion in the response of the modern lighting technologies and high values of flicker perception, although with a lower sensitivity than the incandescent lamp. The results led the authors to propose the definition of a new immunity test to be added to the lamp immunity protocol IEC TR-61547-1, to ensure that newly produced lamps cause limited irritation to grid users.
Highlights
One of the power quality disturbances most perceived by grid customers is flicker
This section describes the materials used in the experimental campaign and the systems employed to collect the data needed to analyze the response of new lighting technologies to RVCs. This includes the set of lamps under test, the measurement system used to supply voltage signals to the lamp and to record their luminous output, and the light flickermeter, the key instrument used to assess the flicker response of the lamps
A selection of voltage signals containing RVCs recorded at real locations on the grid have been supplied to the tested lamps and their responses have been calculated in terms of the instantaneous flicker perception
Summary
One of the power quality disturbances most perceived by grid customers is flicker. In the last few decades, many countries have been implementing regulations to ban incandescent lamps, encouraging the use of more efficient lighting technologies such as CFL and, mainly, Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs) [4,5] This change has a direct effect on the power quality. The replacement of incandescent lamps with more efficient lighting technologies gave rise to poor correlation between measured flicker levels and customers complaints [10,11]. To address this latter problem, many researchers worked to develop new instruments, with the objective of assessing flicker due to modern lighting technologies [12,13,14,15,16]
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