sparks
ELECTRICAL NEWS
october 2014
lighting
24
SCHNEIDER Electric, a specialist in energy man-
agement, showcased its off-grid solar streetlight-
ing solutions at its Xperience Efficiency event,
held for the first time in South Africa on 26 and
27 August 2014.
The organisation emphasised that streetlight-
ing is a need in the southern African environ-
ment to increase the safety of pedestrians and
vehicles, and to support nightly social and
economic activities.
“It is also a muchmore cost-effective means
to light up a city’s monuments and other places
of interest,”says James Shirley, business leader
for the Schneider Electric’s Solar Business in
southern Africa.
He says that the challenges of a grid-connect-
ed solution include strong energy consumption
due to old and defective materials, resulting in
high electricity bills. In addition, an uneven grid
and toomuch pressure on a grid result in no ac-
cess to streetlighting or load-shedding.
“Solar public lighting is booming in new and
sunny economies. Eco friendly, it promises
No electricity bills with standalone LED solar streetlights
electricity and cable free operation for residen-
tial complexes, industrial perimeter lighting and
public road and area lighting. Last but not least
it is often the more efficient way for bringing
security and development to numerous people
living off-grid,”adds Shirley.
“Unfortunately, the current issues associated
with solar lighting include nomaintenance,
vandalism, poor lighting and oversizing.”
He highlights that these issues were taken into
consideration and its research and development
team created innovative components with a sys-
tembased approach especially for the southern
African geographic and socio-economic land-
scape.“As such, we offer an energy management
streetlighting system that ensures the protec-
tion of the battery, provides intelligent lighting
management and enhances the battery life,”he
explains.
Schneider Electric’s NiMH battery also pro-
vides extreme resistance to heat, exceptional
cycling capacity and an expected lifespan of 10
years, far longer than the general one to two
years promised by other solar products currently
iSSL+ and iSSL maxi, Integrated Solar StreetLight
and the UP, Ultra Performant Solar StreetLight
Shirley says that the iSSL Maxi presents a
unique all-in-one concept, to offer efficient
streetlighting to all remote areas, avoiding
electricity bills and trenching.“As plug-and-play
products, the installation is really easy and takes
only fewminutes. The smart energy manage-
ment systemguarantees no blackout, even dur-
ing cloudy periods. Tropicalised, iSSL Maxi is very
heat resistant and offers a very long lifetime,”
he adds. The UP2 offers powerful light output,
perfect for road lighting. Shirley explains that the
UP2 is particularly relevant when the solar panel
has to be tilted in temperate areas, or when a
specific LED lantern is required. As plug and play
products, its battery is integrated behind the
solar panel.“This smart energy management
system also guarantees no blackout, not even
during cloudy periods,”he says. Tropicalised, UP2
is heat resistant and offers a long lifetime.
“In addition, Schneider Electric is aware how
important optics is in streetlighting and offers
two optical lenses tomatch every situation and
need.
“Other differentiating factors include that
our solution-based system is easy to install and
is theft proof. It is also a complete proprietary
system that is CE/ UL certified,”concludes Shirley.
Enquiries: +27 11 254 6400
Shining a light on local music development
LIGHTING specialist, Eurolux, is proud to have
been involved with this year’s Cape Town
World Music Festival, aptly titled‘
Festival of
Music & Light’.
Not only did the festival deliver
‘illuminating’music, it also shone the spot-
light on the development of music.
Eurolux, with the help of renowned design-
er, Heath Nash and Beanstalk Productions,
raisedmuch-needed funds for the Ubuntu
Academy – a school for arts, entrepreneur-
ship and leadership based in Cape Town.
Nash, who is also a popular‘up-cycling’
lighting artist, designed a small inflatable
paper bag lantern, which was illuminated by
an LED. Shaped like a piece of hanging fruit,
the concept anticipated that concert-goers
would buy the lantern and thereby make a
on the market. The organisa-
tion’s LED light engine also has
a high efficiency output of
152 lumens/ watt and offer high
reliability of IP 67 and IK 08.
Added functions are its motion
sensors.
The Schneider Electric solu-
tions available are complete
offer, answering to all kind
of needs, and include: The
donation to charity.
The lanterns were on sale at a
designated area at the festival
and anyone who bought a
lantern was asked to hang their
lantern on a beautifully con-
structed wooden tree, which was
specifically erected for that pur-
pose. The result was an exquisite
organic art-piece, which‘evolved’
during the course of the concert,
symbolising‘growth fromground
roots level’.
The lanterns cost only R10 and, according
to AndrewWex, brandmanager at Eurolux, it
was“challenging”to keep the cost of the lan-
tern down. “Heath donated his time, which
was a huge cost saving. But still, producing a
product locally to suit the requirement was
quite demanding,”he says.
“Eurolux facilitated the creation of the
lanterns making use of local wire workers,
seamstresses and printers, who worked hard
to produce 1 800 lanterns. All proceeds from
the sale of the lanterns went to the Ubuntu
Academy. Apart from the financial donation
to the academy, Eurolux also sponsored
R8 000 worth of festival tickets to some of
the students and, moreover, provided their
transport to the festival. Students from
the Ubuntu Academy also attended the
workshops and talks by industry leaders that
were presented during the Saturday morning
before the festival,”saysWex.
The Ubuntu Academy’s Lillian Schultz
says it was“an invaluable experience for the
students to participate in this international
event”.
“The festival brought together more than
20 bands, featuring artists from South Africa,
Mali, USA, China, Uruguay, Mozambique and
Colombia, amongst others. For our students
to be exposed to the music of these inter-
national artists was a true gift,”says Schultz,
adding that the academy“thanks everyone
involved inmaking this possible”.
Wex says that Eurolux regularly gets
involved with sports, arts and“supports the
organisations that drive change and inspire
greatness”.
“At Eurolux, we hope to continue our
involvement with this project in the future. As
a‘locally-grown’company, we see the value
of investing in the talented youth of South
Africa
We support these creative youngsters who
show a great deal of promise and we want
to do our best to help themdevelop and
succeed.”
Enquiries: +27 21 528 8454
Kevin du Toit, technical sales representative,
BEKA Schréder export branch.
Industry appointments announced
Kyle Davey, sales representative,
BEKA Schréder Johannesburg branch.
Neil Bannister, senior sales representative,
BEKA Schréder Pretoria branch.
