Smart lighting of the Plzeň Brewery complex

Who doesn’t know it? Pilsen beer is now actually a Czech national treasure. The Pilsner Urquell brand is one of the most iconic domestic trademarks ever. Having a “pilsner” is often perceived as having a break and at the same time an opportunity to taste a piece of our own history. As if in better and worse times, this legendary golden drink could shine on our journey on weekdays. The new smart lighting is now shining for the Plzeň brewery complex.

But let’s get on. Today, Pilsner Urquell is first and foremost a large company that, in addition to traditionally excellent beer, also wants to comply with strict obligations in the field of energy and resource savings. Not only does it help save on its own costs, but it also reduces the overall impact on the environment. “When making new investments, we always consider the energy intensity and efficiency of the purchased equipment. We invest in new, more energy-efficient compressors for the production of compressed air or in natural gas boilers with more efficient combustion. We focus on the field of lighting, while in interiors and exteriors we introduced LED lighting with intelligent control of switching on and off using sensors and timers. It is also worth mentioning energy recovery equipment such as economizers for gas boilers, which reuse the heat of the flue gas. We are also introducing complete conceptual changes in technologies such as cooling ice water with a higher evaporating coolant temperature, “says Stanislav Hamara, an investment and production development manager of Plzeň Brewery, responsible for investment projects and sustainable development in the brewery buildings.

The clever lighting of the Plzeň Brewery complex has thus been one of the big investments of recent times. And Teslux Lighting participated as a general lighting supplier; SebiMont, which installs and manages the LoRa and iNELS Air network as a supplier of smart lighting modules.

Modernization that saves

When they decided to solve the modernization of the lighting system in the Plzeň Brewery, they decided on a comprehensive change. So that it is not just a piece-by-piece exchange, but the lights also meet the requirement for remote control of each luminaire separately through a user-friendly interface.

What can smart lighting do today? In addition to controlling each light point separately, there is the possibility to create your own lighting plans. Administrators have the option to set the lighting of the luminaires according to time modes. At the same time, they see all potential faults in the user-friendly system and can solve them operatively.

“Replacing the luminaires logically resulted in significant energy savings, but this is expected automatically from the modernization of the lights. I would say that the great benefit of the whole cooperation is that the LoRaWAN private network is maximum secure. The gateway is connected directly to the system within the complex and the brewery uses its own LoRaWAN Network Server, to which the devices are connected. The investor thus has the entire installation under his own administration and is not fixed to support third parties. In addition, it can add other devices at any time, such as IoT converters for remote energy readings, ”says Jiří Konečný from ELKO EP company.

Technically, the ZHAGA socket was installed in each luminaire, which allowed the luminaire to be expanded with the AirSLC-100L smart lighting module. The module communicates via a wireless LoRaWAN network and is connected to the luminaire via the DALI bus, which is used for communication with the ballast in the luminaire.