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What is the single most advancement in airfield lighting? Simply put it's LED systems. Many airports have installed LED lighting systems adapted to the existing infrastructure but what about new installs and how is it beneficial?

Adding LED lights to an existing infrastructure will save on maintenance because of the proven reliability of the LED as opposed to having bulbs burn out, but do you save any energy? Not really when you consider that the isolation transformer has an efficiency of only 80% to be added to their own power consumption.

This proves to be both expensive and no real savings from power consumption. When a true LED system, such as the ones currently installed by Approach Navigation Systems, is installed there are major advantages to the cost, maintenance and operation. First consider the capital costs; with a LED system there are no isolation transformers, There is much lower voltage used and this means less expensive conductors used between lights. Then there is maintenance costs where there are no bulbs to burn out since each LED has a service life exceeding ten years with a guaranteed intensity. Finally there are the operating costs. Because of the low power consumption of the LED system each LED draws 3 watts at maximum power. Translate this to a 4000 ft runway with threshold and end lights, and say about 10 taxi lights and your total power at max setting is less than 700 Watts, as compared to a conventional system at approximately 4,000 Watts for the same thing. This is at max settings, for lower setting the saving are greater since LED’s track linearly while conventional are more logarithmic. For example at 10 % light output the LED system draws less than 70 watts while the conventional draws about 1800 watts.

Given regulatory considerations, the PEARL (Packaged Elevated Runway Lighting System) is approved for installation currently in Canada for all registered aerodromes up to medium lighting systems, when the new TP312 is released (Sept), this will include certified aerodromes.

ANS is currently installing one new system in Manitoba in May of this year followed by a planned 9 more systems this year. Please see our brochure on the PEARL and contact ANS for more info on this revolutionary new airfield lighting development