AUTOMATED LED LIGHTING COMPENSATION SYSTEM USING SOLAR

ENERGY FOR SHORTENING THE PLANT GROWTH PERIOD.

Phùng Sơn Thanh1,a , Võ Thành Trung1,b, Phạm Hữu Thái 1,c

1
University of Technical Education Ho Chi Minh
a
thanhps@hcmute.edu.vn b thanhtrungspkt2925@gmail.com c phamthai@hcmute.edu.vn
ABSTRACT
For the growth rate of vegetables, time of light exposure and intensity is very important key. The growth period can be
reducing by extending the time of light exposure. This study presents the use of light emitting diodes for light
compensation technique in extending the plant exposure to light. The system composed of light emitting diode, driver
circuit, light intensity sensing circuit, solar charger and battery. When the sunlight intensity is become low light emitting
diode lamps will switch on. The system power supply is DC 12V come from a battery system which was charged by
solar energy. In the experiment, we plan to use mustard, from seedling to crop harvest, under the sunlight exposure, it
takes 30 to 35 days but with the proposed lighting compensation system it only takes 20 to 25 days.
Keywords: light emitting diodes, compensation system, plant growth period, solar energy

1 INTRODUCTION exposure. It is divided into long light exposure

Nowadays, clean foods become issues of plant and short light exposure plant. Light
interest because it directly affects human intensity is the strength of the light which is
health, especially the vegetables. Humans exposed to the plant. The amount of light is
began planting vegetables to cater for their the total light for a day. Neutral type of plants
families and the timing of the plant growth is mainly affected by the amount of light
period is the important key. The ability of exposed to it.
shortening the plant growth period can solve
the problems regarding the instability and the Table 1 Light Spectrum Range (nm) Impact
clean of food production. There are five on Plant Physiology
factors affecting plant growth: light, 280~315 Minimal impact on
temperature, humidity, air, and soil. Of the morphological and physiological
five above factor, the light can be used to process
adjust plant growth and shorten the time of 315~400 Less chlorophyll absorption,
harvest by using the light come from lamps. effect on the impact of the
With the purpose of saving energy, we used photoperiod, prevent stem
the LED light and the power supply coming elongation
from battery system charged by solar energy. 400~520 Chlorophyll and arytenoids has
LED driver circuit with light intensity sensing the largest absorption ratio,
circuit was used in the experiment on the greatly affect the effect of
cultivation of the mustard to verify its photosynthesis
effectiveness. 520~610 Pigment absorption rate is not
high
2 LIGHT COMPENSATION 610~720 Chlorophyll absorption rate is
PRINCIPLES AND SYSTEM low, have a significant effect
ARCHITECTURE on photosynthesis and
2.1 Effect of Wavelength on Plants photoperiod
Light quality, photoperiod, light intensity, and 720~1000 Absorption rate is low, stimulate
the amount of light can affect the growth of cell growth, influence
the plants. Light quality has different flowering and seed germination
wavelengths and colors in the visible light >1000 Converted into heat
spectrum chart. Photoperiod is the time
duration of the plant to accept fixed light
2.2 Automated LED Light Compensation In this system we used the 7Ah battery, after
System full charged it can serve for the system with
The principle of operation of this system is 18 pieces Led for at least 3 nights without
shown in Figure 2. On the left side, light charging from solar energy.
intensity sensing circuit is used to detect the
sunlight during day time, the LED lamp will
not activate and the circuit will go to power
saving mode. When the sunlight intensity
decreases, the light compensation system will
automatically activate the LED lamp, it will
continuously lighten the plants as a
compensation for the insufficiency of light. It
can minimize the probability of insufficient
sunlight due to bad weather condition, and
increase the plant growth rate. In this study
White led was used, the wave length of White
light extends from the 400nm to 750nm.

Figure 3: Actual Set-ups for the Automated

Light Compensation System
The system contents:
(1) The mustard without Automated light
compensation system.
(2) The mustard with Automated light
compensation system.
(3) The 12V 7Ah battery.
(4) The Charger controller.
Figure 1 : Automated Light Compensation (5) The light intensity sensing circuit.
Process Diagram (6) The Led light.
(7) The solar cells.
Table 2 Automated Light Compensation
System Specifications Table
Compensation System White White
Led Led
Light Spectrum (nm) 450 450
Power supply (V) 12 12
LED Quantity (pcs) 12 18
Current consumption 7.8 7.8
during the day (mA)
Current consumption 126.9 170.3
Figure 4: The Led light.
during the night (mA)
Power dissipation during 112.8 112.8
The Led light system content 18 pieces of
the day (mW)
white led, in this system we have a switch to
Power dissipation during 1.5 2.04
choose 12 or 18 super brightness led turning
the night (W)
on at one time. The number of led depends
how large of planning ground. Other hand
Table 2 shows us the power consumption of we have a hi-power led content 3 of 1w led,
the automated Led light compensation system.
 with can be used for 2*2 meter of planning After 27 days, the length of the leaves of
ground mustard. plants that were exposed with the white LED
3 Light Compensation System Experiment light compensation system was measured
Mustard Cultivation Experiment approximately 25cm, larger 6cm in
In the mustard cultivation experiment, comparison with the leaves of other set of
sunlight exposure of the plant is plants.
approximately 12 hours per day on May and
June, and approximately 12 hours per day for
the light compensation circuit. In this
experiment, we used two sets of plants; one of
them was exposed with the automated LED
light compensation system. The other one was
exposed with the sunlight. The two sets of
plant were compared to each other. They can
be seen on figure 3 in which the seed had
germinated 10 days. The photosynthesis effect Figure 6: Mustard after 27 days.
was not obvious because their leaves too
small. However, the difference in size 4 Conclusions
between them can be seen. In figure 5, after The experimental results of this study proved
17 days of planting when their leaves become that LED light compensation circuit increased
bigger, the effect of light compensation was the plant growth. This device can be used in
seen more obviously. bad weather conditions or in sufficient light
conditions. However, it still cannot replace the
sunlight as a primary source of light. The
solar charger and the battery is the main
power. They help us to save energy. The super
brightness LED is small in size and
concentrated. It can save energy and have a
long service life. The cost of planting products
could be decreased when the plant growth
become shorter by using the automated led
lighting compensation system using solar
energy.
Figure 5: Mustard after 17 days.
REFERENCES
[1] Wen-Yaw Chung, Po-Tsun Chen (2012) Automated LED Lighting Compensation System for
Shortening the Plant Growth Period. AFITA2012
[2] Riddoch, I., J. Grace, F. E. Fasehun, B. Riddoch and D. O. Ladipo (1991) Photosynthesis and
successional status of seedling in a tropical semidecidous rain forest in Nigeria. Joural of Ecology
79:491-503.
[3] Ảnh hưởng của ánh sáng đến quang hợp http://www.thuviensinhhoc.com/chuyen-de-sinh-
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[4] Kỹ thuật trồng cải bẹ xanh http://agriviet.com/threads/ky-thuat-trong-cai-be-
xanh.1065/#axzz2qRvR0QOz