Oreon receives DLC listing for water-cooled LED fixtures

Oreon is excited to announce that its water-cooled LED fixtures are now qualified to receive the DesignLights Consortium® (DLC) listing. “The DLC listing emphasizes that the high efficiency and reliability of our LED grow lights and water cooling technology is recognized by an independent and renowned party,” states Twan Mennink, CTO of Oreon.

The DLC is a non-profit organization improving energy efficiency, lighting quality, and the human experience in the built environment. Utility companies, energy efficiency programs, manufacturers, lighting designers, building owners, and government entities collaborate to create solutions for a better future with better lighting.

Due to a lack of testing methods and standards, and testing requirements for liquid-cooled lamps, DLC was unable to list Oreon on their Qualified Product List (QPL) before. Even though the DLC supported the actively cooled lighting method by saying that liquid-cooled LEDs “hold great promise for increased efficacy and lifetime, as well as the ability to more efficiently move and use waste heat in an enclosed facility”, until recently no water-cooled LED fixtures could be DLC listed.

For the past years Oreon has been in regular contact with DLC to discuss a set of technical requirements that would correctly reflect the properties of water-cooled light fixtures. This resulted in DLC adding liquid-cooled fixtures to their Technical Requirements for LED-based Horticultural Lighting Version 2.1, in Sept 2021. In parallel, Oreon had intensive talks with accredited labs to prepare their facilities for testing performance of water-cooled fixtures according to DLC specifications. Oreon’s fixtures are tested against the UL8800 safety standard, and bear the ETL mark proving that they meet all relevant safety standards. Besides that, the high efficient Oreon fixtures amply comply with the DLC requirements, resulting in the Monarch top light fixture receiving a DLC listing.

“We are delighted about the possibility for water-cooled fixtures to be DLC listed. A good and justified decision of DLC. Water cooling results in smaller fixtures, higher output, better efficiency and the possibility to reuse imparted heat. Properties that are beneficial to the growers, utility companies and the environment”, says Bill Whittaker, sales manager North America at Oreon. “The DLC listing underlines these generic qualities of our fixtures. The combination of customer demands and our ability to tailor light spectra will result in a range of products being certified and added to the DLC list in the future”.

The DLC website provides growers a well-documented guarantee of efficiency for each lighting product. Whittaker: “With our DLC listing, growers in North America can now opt for a rebate from utility companies on purchasing our DLC-listed fixtures. Many utility companies are structuring rebates programs for growers to change from High Pressure Sodium (HPS) to energy-efficient LED grow lights to offer 10-50% back on the upfront product cost and to shorten the ROI.”

Click here to read the article at iGrow News, Greenhouse Canada, FloralDaily and HortiDaily.com.