World Premiere LED Illumination of Sports Field in Eindhoven

Monday evening April, 20 2009, the city of Eindhoven presents in cooperation with the companies Heijmans and LED Expert a world premiere : Dynamic LED illumination on sports field. On the “speelen beweegplein” of Sportcomplex Eindhoven-Noord a test installation of this innovative illumination will be revealed. When the test experiences are positive, in the future this low-energy, sustainable and cost saving LED illumination will be installed on all city owned sport fields.

By using this sport filed illumination in a dynamic way, the wishes and requirements of the sportsman can be implemented far better. This will increase the joy and pleasure for the sportsman, as well as it will support a sustainable future.
 
The implementation of dynamic behaviour can only be realised with LEDs. LEDs can be switched on and off more than a million times per second, and are stepless dimmable. Energy consumption of LED sport filed illumination is, at full brightness, about 25-30 % less than of conventional sport filed illumination.
 
LEDExpert has succeeded in designing, building and demonstrating a professional LED sport field illumination luminary with an intense and precise bundle of light. This gives the advantage of lower power consumption, but also reducing drastically the light pollution in the surroundings of the sport park.
  
Example of dynamic use of sport field illumination are:
The light of tennis courts can be switched off when no-one is using the court. The LED light can be also switched on direct after switch of, and will immediately have 100 % light power (no warm-up time). An other example is at hockey training on penalty corners (one goal), where one can switch off, or dim the lights for that moment on the other parts of that sport field.
  
Sustainable climate and association with sports and technology:
Together with inhabitants, research institutions, companies and visitors the city of Eindhoven enables a town where it is good and pleasant to live and work. Now and in the future. Eindhoven is a town, which is aware about the quality of its environment and therefore invests in sustainability and climate.
  
In addition, Eindhoven deploys widely on a practical connection between sports and technology. Sportcomplex Noord therefore has set up a special fieldlab to stimulate sport, which develops innovative technical solutions that are also used in the whole sport.
  
Advantages of the use of LED illumination in sport fields:
The city of Eindhoven and its partners (Heijmans and LED Expert) are convinced of the usefulness of the development and the use of dynamic LED illumination. This leads to the following practical advantages:
1. Flexible and active use
The brightness can be smoothly adjusted, which enables tailored illumination solutions. The spotlights can be switched on immediately after switch-off (in comparison conventional sport lights need approximately 30 minutes before you can switch them on again). The intention is that trainers and coaches of sport clubs get special energy passes in the future, to force them to use the LED illumination with care and awareness. With this, they can adjust the brightness on the sport fields by the time of the day, the number of players or at changing of the teams.
2. Savings on the use of energy and reduction of light pollution
The efficient use of LED illumination, definitely also when used in conjunction with the energy pass, bring substantial savings of the use of energy and therefore also a substantial saving on the cost of energy for the end users. By making use of the concentrated LED light bundle on one field, the light pollution can be reduced substantial in the surroundings of sport parks.
  
In this way, an energy power consumption reduction of an additional 30-35 % can be reached. With this world premiere it will be more easy to create a better awareness and empowerment with sportsman and sportswomen. In combination with energy passes the sportsperson and/or sports club, will be rewarded to use energy with more awareness.
 
In Eindhoven, with over 600 light poles at sport fields, dynamic sport field illumination also helps greatly in creating a CO2 neutral town.