Lighting is an essential service in all the industries. The power consumption by the indusrtial lighting varies between 2% to 10% of the total power depending on the type of industry. Innovation and continuous improvement in the field of lighting, has given rise to tremendous energy saving opportunities in this area.
The simplest and the most widely used form of controlling a lighting installation is "On-Off" switch. In the electrical lighting system in our community, especially in the various households and the street lighting system, it will be observed that lots of electrical power is being wasted as a result of negligence and ineffectiveness on the part of our local power authority (PHCN), State electricity board, parastatals in charge of electric power management, and various house occupants.
It will be observed that large quantity of energy is wasted as a result of poor or manual switching technique of our lighting system in Nigeria. It is a common occurrence and often noticed that the public street lighting along our streets or roads are being left 'ON' throughout the day and night time as a result of negligence and ineffectiveness of the operators that manage the manual switching 'ON' and 'OFF' of the lighting system. Household occupants also tend to leave their lighting 'ON' throughout the day due to negligence and ignorance. Thereby leading to electrical power wastage and excessive loading of transformers particularly in the industrial areas where we have heavy industrial machinery running combined with public consumption in the day time.
Having observed these problems being encountered, this project will be developed to bring about the automation of the switching of lighting system using light depending resistor (LDR). The project is an electronic switch that is controlled (turned on and off) by the amount of light shining on the LDR. When light strikes the LDR, the switch opens (turns off); when the LDR is in darkness, the switch