Kakatiya Energy Systems, an energy management company, announced its new outdoor lighting product, Nature Switch™ an automated street lighting control system. Nature Switch™ is an affordable, off-the-shelf alternative to traditional lighting controls. It utilizes innovative switching controls and when coupled with optional auto-dimming technology for HID (high intensity discharge) lamps, it can reduce up to 40 percent of energy usage by reducing the wattage of HID lamps from 100 per cent to 60 per cent of the wattage during non-peak hours on national highways and state roads, a release by Kakatiya said.
Nature Switch™ is designed to automatically adjust to seasonal day length, requiring no manual reset at any point. The high precision of the technology is such that even clouds, rain, fog, mist, or shade will not cause the lights to switch on during the day whereas traditional sensor based controls are either on during a portion of the day or off during a portion of the night caused due to judgmental errors of the sensors.
In addition, Kakatiya’s Save Switch feature incorporates automatic dimming technology for HID lamps, which allows for more efficient use of energy in lighting. For example, Save Switch feature can automatically dim street and highway road lights during periods of low traffic reducing energy usage, and leading to substantial savings to utilities and municipalities.
On average, one 250 watt lamp using Save Switch over the course of one year can save 285 kWh of electricity, or about Rs.1,700 (assuming seven hours per day at non-peak operation at Rs.6 per kwh, the release noted.