BOULDER, Colo., Nov. 10, 2004 (PRIMEZONE) -- Energy Conservation Technologies, Inc. (Econ) (Pink Sheets:ENYC), a Nevada-based corporation originally founded in 2000, released an example of the cost savings potential for its new high-technology electronic HID ballasts for High Pressure Sodium and Metal Halide lamps.
Streetlights throughout the world use High Pressure Sodium bulbs, part of the HID (High Energy Discharge) lamp sector; the most common size being the 250-watt. At the present time, these bulbs are powered by magnetic ballasts that waste 50-watts or more of electrical energy. In addition, the magnetic ballasts cannot be dimmed without disturbing power lines and weigh about 20 pounds, requiring the structures that hold these ballasts to be designed and engineered to take the abuses of winds and other stresses imposed by the elements.
Unfortunately, the ballast market is driven by its price and currently there is no commercially available HID electronic ballast that can compete with a magnetic ballast price.
Econ's electronic ballast is comparable with magnetic ballast costs, weighs 2 pounds; 10 times less than a magnetic ballast and approaches 95 percent-plus efficiencies by saving in excess of 70-watt of electrical energy when a dimming feature is included.
In the United States, where energy is relatively cheap, a 50-watt electrical energy loss per 250-watt street light fixture is often ignored. However, in many world economies where energy is expensive and strained this energy waste is a going concern.
Mexico City, with over one million (1,000,000) streetlights using 250-watt street light sodium vapor bulbs, is an excellent example where significant electrical energy savings can be achieved using Econ's electronic HID ballast technology.
-- 1,000,000 bulbs with an average savings per bulb of 70 watts.
-- Average per day use: 10 hours.
-- Savings per day: 70-watt x 10 hours = 700-watt hours or .7
kilowatt-hours.
-- Cost per Kilowatt: $0.20
-- Savings per day / 250-watt streetlight: $0.20 X 0.7 kilowatt-
hour = $0.14.
-- Savings per year/bulb: $.14 x 365 days or $51.10.
-- Savings per year for 1,000,000 light fixtures based upon 365
days: $51.1 million (51,100,000).
Every major city is confronted with some proportion of this savings example. Fazle Quazi, the companies chairman and a gas plasma physicist, estimates a payback period of less than one year. In addition, Econ's ballast is designed to work well with the fluctuating currents found in Mexico and throughout the world.
The above example would be modest in larger wattage uses, such as the 400-watt bulbs used in many warehouses, airports and stadiums. In addition, the cost to manufacture these larger capacity electronic ballasts using Econ's technology would be even cheaper than a magnetic ballast. Thus there would be a major cost savings in using the electronic ballast for construction as well as even more dramatic energy savings.
About Energy Conservation Technologies, Inc.
Energy Conservation Technologies, Inc. holds a patent for "Control Circuit for power factor corrected electronic ballasts and power supplies," patent No: 6,359,395, granted on March 19, 2002, developed by its founder, Fazle Quazi. The current patent covers power factor corrections and controlling energy into bulbs and power supplies such as: computer servers, copy machines, compact fluorescent lamps, power supplies to the telecom industry, inverters used to convert DC power to AC power (120 volts), automobiles specialty lighting, solar and wind power generators, and fuel cells.
New patent applications involving the lighting industry are now being drafted after extensive testing. These new designs will revolutionize the HID lighting industry, annually a $2 billion dollar market in the United States and over $10 billion on an international basis. Econ's HID electronic ballasts will be available at costs comparable to magnetic ballasts, reducing ballast weight by a factor of 10 and saving an estimated 35 percent of electrical energy over magnetic ballast usage.
Discussions are now in progress with a major lighting manufacturer in Mexico and with a Fortune 500 company regarding licensing our patents and future patent filings.
FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENT DISCLAIMER:
Statements describing objectives or goals or our future plans are forward-looking statements and are subject to certain risks and uncertainties, including among other factors our financial performance, our ability to market our new designs and the performance of those designs, the market for ballasts, other technological developments in ballasts and lighting in general, which could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected in this release.