電子驅動提高零售照明效率

　　在零售、招待和許多商業設施照明方面，美學考慮占主導地位。然而，各國政府越來越關注零售環境中的能源消耗問題。照明占能源成本的很大一部分，因為商店需要在整個營業時間保持照明。組織如加利福尼亞能源委員會已經起草了建議零售商，希望鼓勵他們尋求照明更節能的方法。1幫助提高效率的過程中，電力電子控制，新的照明技術來提供更大的選擇光源提供更低的電力需求和顏色和輸出水平更大的控制。

　　例如，調光支持變得很重要。商店現在被劃分為光區，使人們能夠在靠近窗戶的地方收獲自然采光，并根據室外的天氣條件將能源消耗降到最低限度。此外，對燈光顏色的精心控制可以產生更吸引人的顯示屏，節省大量的能源。例如，一項由倫斯勒理工學院的研究人員發現，彩色的燈光–本例主要藍色LED–隨著提供功率減少了30%的購物者比明亮，無色照明中比較好的一種主觀印象的使用。2研究表明顏色對比度比整體照明水平更重要。

　　The demand for high-brightness lighting in the retail environment has led to the widespread use of halogen lighting in many public areas. Traditional retail lighting uses halogen lamps rated at 150 W to illuminate items for sale in stores. Today， the same amount of lumen output can be achieved using HID lighting elements that consume a third of that power. Traditionally， HID lamps have been used mainly for high-bay installations where high area coverage is needed but the lighting technology is moving into track-lighting fixtures suitable for the office and retail environment. This trend has been helped by the adoption of HID lighting in the automotive market， where similar-sized bulbs are employed.

　　Metal-halide sources are available that produce 2500 lumens from a 30 W power input， making it possible to build intense spotlights that can be used for impressive window displays in the retail environment. However， these lamps demand intelligent electronics to maintain control and deal with some potential drawbacks. Without electronic control， HID lamps can take a long time to start up and cannot be restarted for as long as 20 minutes after power has been withdrawn （Figure 1）。