How to Longer The Solar Lights’ Lighting Time?
At present, the application of solar lights is more and more extensive, and the demand for solar lights is also increasing. But solar energy is unstable. And some places need long-term stable lighting, such as highways and main roads. This requires a unique outdoor design to ensure that solar-led street lights can work stably for a long time in rainy weather. Here we list 5 ways to prolong outdoor solar light lighting time on cloudy days.
- Big Power Solar Panel + Mppt controllers
- High lumens efficacy led
- Smart dimming way
- Hybrid on-grid
- Hybrid wind turbine
Monocrystalline Solar Panel & Mppt Controllers
There is no doubt that monocrystalline solar panels have higher power than polycrystalline solar panels under low light conditions. For solar panels with the same power, monocrystalline solar panels are smaller in size and lighter than polycrystalline solar panels. Because the solar street lamp is installed on the pole, the smaller the size of the solar panel, the lighter the weight, and the more reliable the solar lamp installed on the pole.
Similarly, the performance of the MPPT controller in rainy weather is better than that of the PWM controller. We have done a test on a rainy day. On rainy days, a 60-watt monocrystalline solar panel can output about 15W when connected to the MPPT controller, while the output power, when connected to the PWM controller, is only 6-7W.
Our other suggestion is to add solar panels instead of adding batteries. On the one hand, the cost of solar panels is much lower than that of batteries. On the other hand, batteries can only store energy, and solar panels are the components that generate energy. The main factor that affects the reliability of solar lamps is the generation of energy.
High Luminous Efficacy Led Solutions
Choosing LED chips with high lumen efficiency is also the key to reducing the solar street lights price. The same lumens and higher efficiency chips can be achieved with lower power. This way, we can use lower solar panels and batteries to match the corresponding power. Among the various accessories of solar street lights, the cost of solar panels and batteries is much higher than that of LEDs. Therefore, we advocate using high-efficiency LED chips in solar street lights.
For the same reason, if the solar and battery settings remain unchanged, a higher-efficiency LED chip can achieve the same lumens with lower power. Therefore, the solar lamp can maintain a longer lighting time.
Smart Dimming Way
Because of the low-voltage DC characteristics of solar street lights, we can easily control solar street lights. The smart control of the solar lights includes dark to dawn dim, motion dim, and auto-time dim. The so-called dark-to-dawn dim means that solar street lights can be turned off during the day and turned on at night by themselves. Inductive dimming means that the power of solar streetlights reaches 100% when someone is nearby. When no one is nearby, the power of the solar street light automatically becomes 30% to save energy. Time-controlled dimming is a way of saving energy similar to induction dimming. It can make solar lights automatically adjust the power percentage of solar lights in each time period to save energy reasonably. Therefore, solar street lights can also be called ”smart solar street lights“.
Hybrid On-grid Power
That is, solar streetlights are connected to the utility grid. When the battery is still charged, the battery gives priority to the LED light. The grid supplies power to the led lights when the battery is dead. No matter how many cloudy and rainy days, the solar lamp can be guaranteed to work 100%. Undoubtedly, the reliability of led lights in this way is the highest. But because of the need to pull wires and connect to the grid, the cost of this method will be much higher. Regarding the cost savings of solar lights, you can check out our article on the advantages of solar lights.
Hybrid Wind Turbine
That is solar light plus wind energy. Usually, the wind will be more abundant in rainy weather, so the combination of wind and solar will make the lighting time of the LED lamp more stable. However, the current cost of wind turbines is relatively high, and the reliability is not high. The so-called low reliability is mainly reflected in two aspects. First, solar street lights use low-power generators, such as 100W. The lifespan of small-power generators is not long. Second, there is not enough research and development on wind and solar controllers in the market, and the quality of such controllers has yet to be verified by large-scale projects.