Nowadays, control systems for lighting installations are used, among other functionality, to improve energy efficiency and to set different lighting outputs of the luminaires according to punctual requirements. This allows increasing energy efficiency by adapting the installation to environmental needs. Current control systems are mainly oriented to point-2-point architectures, which in most cases, are complex and expensive. As an alternative, we present the viability analysis of a sustainable control architecture for lighting installations to improve those drawbacks. This control system uses a communication technique based on controlled power-on/off sequences in the power line of the luminaires to configure different dimming profile schedules. An implementation for LED equipment with the design of an electronic CPU based on a microcontroller is described along with a study of its configuration capability. In addition, we present the set of results obtained using this system in a real outdoor public lighting installation. Furthermore, an economic amortization study of power line communication (PLC) or radio frequency (RF) control architectures versus the results of this proposal are detailed. The analysis presents the proposal as a simple but more robust and sustainable solution compared to current point-2-point systems used with streetlights: The return on investment (ROI) period is reduced allowing all the basic functionality expected—in—field output light dimming profiles selection.

Sustainability and energy prices make the energy production from renewable sources necessary and photovoltaic energy is ideal on an urban scale and on isolated facilities. However, when the demand for energy is at night, as in lighting installation, the use of accumulative systems is necessary. The use of batteries can account for more than 70% of the budget of these systems and have a critical impact in the project. This problem increases when the installation’s location moves away from the equator, as the variation between the duration of days and nights increases. This implies that the system must be oversized to almost triple its generation and storage capacity to guarantee operation. This paper proposes the use of a robust and affordable electronic centralized management system that can regulate the consumption based on the energy available in the batteries. To test this system, a real case of outdoor lighting nanogrid has been used. The facility has been powered by a grouped photovoltaic battery system dimensioned for the average year solar conditions with and without consumption management. When used without regulation, in winter or cloudy days, there have been repetitive crashes of the system. On the other hand, with the use of the electronic control proposed, the shutdowns have been avoided, regulating the lighting level when necessary. Thus, more efficient and economically affordable systems can be designed which can help to spread the installation of isolated photovoltaic lighting.

Sustainability and energy prices make the use of energy obtained from renewable sources on an urban scale and for isolated local facilities necessary for municipal authorities. Moreover, when the demand of energy is at night, as for street lighting installations, the use of accumulative systems is necessary, which means a major drawback due to a short lifetime expectancy and high cost. The use of batteries can require more than 70% of the budget of these lighting systems and has a critical impact in the project. The problem to solve is finding different renewable energy sources that can produce energy throughout the day, especially during the night, at the same time at which it is consumed. As one of the competences of municipal authorities is water supply networks, this paper analyzes the use of energy recovery turbines within these installations as an alternative to photovoltaic generators. To study the viability and effectiveness of this alternative, the water flows available in the network of a medium-size municipality were monitored and analyzed in depth to assess the amount of recoverable energy. In addition, an energy recovery turbine (ERT) station was set up, installing a bypass around one of the pressure-reducing valves (PRV) of the installation where energy is dissipated without practical use. The results obtained imply that the system proposed has economical and technical viability, is reliable and guarantees full service in all the seasons’ conditions. Moreover, the needs of the energy storage capacity are much lower (~8%) than with solar panels.