Emergency lighting has become an essential part of every commercial building. It automatically turns on during power outage and ensures that paths are lit so that occupants can safely exit from a building in the event of an emergency.

And with the growing popularity of emergency lighting, LED emergency drivers have made emergency lighting simpler. LED emergency drivers are designed for light fixtures that need a driver to operate properly. It operates on a battery with a wide range of wattages instead of line voltage to supply power to the LED fixture.

Here are some reasons how LED emergency drivers has simplified emergency lighting

Distributed Power Supply

Traditionally, emergency lighting’s back-up power has relied on an inverter for sections of the circuit or central back-up generator for the entire emergency lighting circuit. This makes a power supply centralized and fixtures are permanently mounted throughout the space. In case the centralized power supply fails to provide power, the entire emergency lighting system fails.

But thanks to the LED Emergency driver the power supply of emergency lighting is decentralized at the fixture level. Both LED driver and battery are integrated into luminaire which helps to supply a constant charge to the battery. And the main benefit of installing the LED emergency driver is luminaires are not dependent on each other i.e. if the battery fails in a luminaire it’s doesn’t affect another luminaire which ensures the path is still lit even a luminaire fails.

Luminaires with Both Normal and Emergency Mode Support

The best thing about the LED emergency drive is, it can automatically switch between normal and emergency mode providing a consistent level of light even with obstructions or different ceiling height.

The back-up battery within the fixture is also charged directly by the driver. While AC power is ON, the emergency LED driver stays in Normal Mode and charges the emergency battery pack. And when AC power fails, it automatically uses battery backup power by switching to emergency mode. The emergency driver returns to Normal Mode once the AC power is restored.

With the help of an LED emergency drive, you can maintain a consistent light output and also get rid of up/down dimming performance.

Self-Test Option – Monthly or Annual

To ensure the emergency lighting is working correctly, it is essential to test the lighting system monthly or annually depending upon the type of building. In the case of a traditional emergency lighting system, it can be tested in many ways depending upon the system being used. You can walk through the building and manually push the test button of every emergency fixture and record the results. Or you can also install self-diagnostic emergency fixtures which will run monthly tests and the annual test.

But again all this testing hassle is completely eliminated by self-testing LED emergency drivers. The monthly and annual test has become too easy. They control/monitor circuit of the emergency driver automatically performs a 30-sec test once a month and a full 90-minute test once a year. You don’t need to climb a ladder just to push a test button, the test switch can be easily seen during a quick walk-thru of the building. This will definitely save you a lot of time and bring down maintenance costs.

Catherine Gomez