UV Light Technology Used to Purify Air and Eradicate Odors

Germicidal UVC technology is successfully used to purify air and remove offensive odors in a broad range of settings including industrial, commercial, healthcare, educational and residential.  It is an efficient and cost-effective method to disinfect air without producing hazardous waste or byproducts.  The type of air-borne transmissible agents it targets is fungi, bacteria, viruses, spores, parasites and dust mites.

Known as ultraviolet germicidal irradiation, it works by inactivating various airborne microbes and aids in the prevention of airborne transmissible diseases.  Various studies suggest that 254nm is the best germicidal wavelength in the UV spectrum.  This means it is most effective in penetrating the cell walls of micro-organisms, and destroying both their DNA/RNA as well as their ability to replicate.  One important application for UVC light technology is HVAC units, which provide an ideal environment for molds and bacterial contaminants to accumulate. To keep the system cleaner, UVC lights are placed above the air conditioning cooling A-coil or directly through it. The lights reduce the need for manual maintenance as well as the necessity of cleaning with harmful chemicals.

Another use for germicidal UVC light is to remove VOC byproducts that are a result of a variety of different industrial operations.  It is especially important to provide odor control when offensive or noxious fumes affect nearby businesses and residences.   To control odor and improve indoor air quality (IAQ), 185nm is generally the wavelength used as it also generates ozone (03).  This chemical reaction disinfects and deodorizes almost any environment and the ozone converts most airborne pollutants into benign, odor-free by-products.  The process especially offers facilities like waste water treatment plants an effective, safe way to neutralize odors and to be more neighbor-friendly.     

LightSources, along with our affiliated companies, represent today’s leading high-tech designers and manufacturers in the lamp industry.  Our products are used globally in a multitude of applications and industries such as our UV germicidal lamps that offer patent-protected, OEM-oriented solutions.  Please contact us to learn more about our large selection of specialty custom and standard lamps.

Terms Used to Describe our UV Lamps

At the LightSources group, we provide a wide range of UV lamps for virtually any application.  While browsing through our extensive website, we encourage you to take a look at our educational area where you will find a glossary of terms commonly used to describe our lamps.  The following is a few definitions you may find helpful.

One word that is used in our specifications is “nanometer”, or the abbreviation, “nm”.   A nanometer is one billionth of a meter and equals 10-9 meter, 10-3 micron or 10 Angstrom.  In the lighting industry, it is used to define the wavelength of light, particularly in the UV and visible ranges of the electromagnetic spectrum.  One wavelength equals the distance between two successive wave crests or troughs.  

Another term used to describe our lamps is “spectral output”, which is the radiant output of a lamp versus wavelength.  While it can be displayed in a variety of ways, most commonly it is in a graph or chart that plots output watts against wavelengths and is influenced by the wavelength resolution used.  Also “energy density” is another important term to understanding the technology.  It is defined as the amount of energy stored in a given system or region of space per unit volume or mass.  For a parallel and perpendicularly incident beam, not scattered or reflected, energy density and fluency become identical.

“Emission spectrum” is the radiation from an atom or atoms in an excited state, usually displayed as radiant power vs. wavelength. It is seen as bright lines or bands when the electromagnetic radiation emitted by a substance is passed into a spectrometer. 

Please see our website for more lighting definitions.  While you are there, take a look at our complete line of UV germicidal lamps (including low pressure, medium pressure and high pressure ultra-violet), specialty fluorescent lamps, tanning lamps, and outdoor sign products.

LightSources and its affiliated companies – LCD Lighting, Voltarc, LightTech, and Cerlux represent the leading high-tech designers and manufacturers in the lamp industry today.  Our products are used worldwide and are found in a multitude of applications and industries such as our UV germicidal lamps that offer patent-protected, OEM-oriented solutions. 

How to Care for Your MPUV Lamps

LightSources and LightTech are the experts in designing, engineering and manufacturing high-quality medium pressure ultraviolet lamps (MPUV) so we know an awful lot about how to care for them.  We wish to share a few important tips on how to extend the life of your lamps.  If you have other questions we have not addressed here or simply need more information, check the educational section on our website. 

One of our first tips is to not start your lamps at too low of a power.  The reason for this is when a MPUV lamp is first started it is cold and the little power it has is needed to heat the mercury so it transforms from a liquid to a gas.  The cooling element of the lamp is designed for the lamp to be running at full power.  If the power is initially too low at the start, it can prevent the mercury from vaporizing and keep the lamp from ever getting hot.  This low power arc is called “caught in a glow mode.”  With the lamp in this overly cooled mode, it is unable to properly start and can burn itself out. 

Another common problem is too much cooling for lamps operating in idle mode.  This occurs when a lamp is not being used and has had the power turned way down in an effort to conserve energy.  The cooling can cause the mercury to condense, which in turn drops the lamp’s voltage and creates an environment for the “caught in the glow mode.”  The lesson here is if you need to put your equipment into an idle mode, you must ensure there is enough power to prevent over-cooling the lamp. 

A simple summation of our tips include: avoiding excessive cold starts, starting lamps at high power, and avoiding excessive lamp starts.  In addition be sure to clean your lamps and equipment, especially the ventilating system as well as check and replace reflectors regularly.  Lastly make sure lamp connections are clean and tight.  See our website for more troubleshooting tips.    

LightSources and its affiliated companies – LCD Lighting, Voltarc, LightTech, and Cerlux represent the leading high-tech designers and manufacturers in the lamp industry today. Our standard lamps and components as well as customized products offer high-quality solutions to meet our partner’s unique needs.  Contact us to learn more about our wide selection of lamps.

UVC Lamps - Safe, Cost-effective Disinfection for Drinking Water

Although water covers 97% of the earth’s surface, the majority of it is salt water and unsuitable for drinking.  It is estimated that only 2.5% of our water supply is drinkable and even less (only 1%) is clean enough for drinking water.  At the same time, the demand for clean water is growing along with the population.  We know that each year as many as two million people die from drinking contaminated water. 

Given the fact there is 156,000 municipal  drinking water systems in the US alone that serve 90% of the population, using methods to treat water safely and not harm the environment is extremely important.  One alternative that is quickly gaining popularity is Ultraviolet (UVC) amalgam lamp disinfection.  Not only does it provide an environmentally friendly way to disinfect water, but also ease of use, minimal maintenance and very low operating costs.

However while germicidal UVC light does not entirely replace chemical disinfection for non-point-of-use, it does significantly reduce the need for chemicals.  Supplemental chemicals are still needed to protect the water after it leaves the irradiated area as the UVC method has no disinfection residual to protect water that sits in pipes for days before it is consumed.

Unlike traditional chemical treatment, UVC light disinfection has the advantage of effectively eliminating cryptosporidium and giardia bacterium.  Another benefit to germicidal UV water purification includes the fact that biological contaminants cannot build resistance to UV light.  Also for consumers, the process does not alter the taste, odor or pH value of the water.

At LightSources and LightTech, our innovative amalgam lamps have the capacity of yielding up to three times the UVC output when compared to traditional standard and high output low pressure germicidal lamps.  See our website to learn more about our line of cost-effective germicidal lamps.   

LightSources and our strategic partner LightTech, along with our affiliated companies, represent the leading high-tech designers and manufacturers in the lamp industry today.  Our products are used world-wide in a multitude of applications and industries such as our UV germicidal lamps that offer patent-protected, OEM-oriented solutions. 

Effective Waste Water Disinfection with UVC Technology

Currently more than twenty percent of wastewater treatment plants in North America use UVC light technology.  While the number of waste water treatment plants using chlorine disinfection is higher, UVC light disinfection is more often the choice for new facilities being built worldwide.  To make the decision more clear-cut, the costs of UVC systems over the last several decades has decreased to make it much more competitive with chlorine systems.  This is due in part to a huge improvement in lamp and system designs as well as the reliability of these systems. 

The biggest advantage to UVC is that it is a more environmentally-friendly technology and does not produce dangerous by-products that can get into the environment.  UVC systems also typically cost less to maintain and are the most effective way to deal with chlorine resistant protozoa such as Cryptosporidium and Giardia.  The safety of the system helps municipalities comply with strict federal and local standards for public safety and environmental protection. In chlorine disinfection systems, the chlorination of residual organic material can generate chlorinated-organic compounds that can be cacogenic and harmful to the environment.   

A UVC disinfection system uses either low-pressure or medium-pressure mercury arc lamps, a reactor, and ballasts. To effectively inactivate micro-organisms, the optimum wavelengths of the UVC lamps need to be in the range of 250 to 270 nm.  Also when setting up a system careful planning is required as the intensity of the radiation is affected by the distance of the lamps to the material to be disinfected.   

LightSources and LightTech offer a range of quality low pressure UVC lamps, low pressure amalgam lamps and medium pressure high power lamps that are used in waste water treatment plants throughout the world.  We invite you to browse our website or contact our engineers to discover more about our germicidal UVC lamps. 

LightSources and our affiliated companies represent the leading high-tech designers and manufacturers in the lamp industry today.  Our team consists of the most highly skilled professionals that specialize in a range of innovative solutions.  Please contact us to learn more about our broad range of standard and custom lighting solutions.