New Industry Products

Advanced Energy Introduces New Hot Swappable Power Supplies For Lighting Systems

March 02, 2022 by Antonio Anzaldua Jr.

Reaching 4000 W and nearly 95% efficiency, Advanced Energy’s new LCM4000HV series is a hot target for industrial and commercial lighting systems.

In many sectors of the profession, engineers strive to implement redundancy within systems, to ensure proper handling of future faults or failures.

A common tool for introducing redundancy is the hot swappable component.These components are usually found in hard drives, CPUs, and power conversion modules. Their killer feature is that they can be removed and replaced without interrupting the system, or for that matter affecting it in any manner.

In the absence of hot swappable devices, engineers lack flexibility. Were a section of lights in an industrial lighting system to need maintenance, for instance, an engineer may need to turn off the entire section before making replacements. This could be problematic to facilities that require lighting around the clock, such as the aforementioned industrial lighting system, in addition to semiconductor fabrication labs and agricultural lighting systems. 

 

Hot Swappable and Scalable: The LCM4000HV Series

With the introduction of its latest hot swappable power supplies, Advanced Energy has simplified LED lighting for application in horticultural and commercial systems. The company announced its new LCM4000HV series supplies in tandem with a recommended LCM12K 19” 1U rack mount, which targets medium to large-scale LED lighting layouts. 

Rigged up, the setup is capable of intaking 208 to 600 VAC from single to three-phase sources, while providing 4 kW of power with flicker-free current control. For more juice, one LCM12K rack can house up to three LCM4000HV modules to deliver 12kW of power. 

 

The new hot swappable supplies. Image used courtesy of Advanced Energy

 

For larger systems, designers can layout 10 LCM12K in a standard 10U rack enclosure, with Advanced Energy blocks providing 120 kW of power. For consumers requiring a still larger system, the series can be scaled further via the introduction of additional rack enclosures. 

 

Sophisticated Circuitry 

At the circuit level, these hot swappable devices carry additional benefits. The circuitry within the power module is able to respond to low and high levels of fault conditions without external components, enabling the supplies to maintain a small footprint. 

This hot swap circuitry also features inrush-current limiting of 25 A at 180 VAC and a 60 A peak in three-phase systems. 

 

Lightening the Maintenance Load 

Beyond power saving, the LCM4000HV series supplies also allow for smooth maintenance, due to their hot plug capability. What’s more, for horticultural lighting systems, the 12 kW rack mount shelf can be housed away from the growing sections in a control room, making it easier to access the components in the first place. 

 

The LCM12K rack mount. Image used courtesy of Advanced Energy

 

Once installed, properly maintained LCM4000HV supplies should operate for an average of at least 200,000 hours. Each module comes complete with a five-year warranty.

With the new supplies, indoor growers can save up to 50% of their power conversion expenses, allowing them to maximize productivity, said Joe Voyles, vice president of Industrial Power Conversion at Advanced Energy.

 

Feature image used courtesy of AeroFarms