Europe’s Largest Retailer Lights Up New Stores with SynJet Thermal Management

SynJet Cooling Solutions and Thermal Management for Carrefour Stores

Project Overview:

End User: Carrefour
Location: Ecully and Venissieux, France
Application: Retail Low Bay
Products: 4,000 Sunlux LED fixtures
Partners: Sunlux

Situation:

Designed to make shopping more comfortable and fun, the two Planet Carrefour pilot stores are segmented into eight specialized departments and boast wider aisles, better ventilation and a color-coded signage system. Also central to the stores’ new functionality is the lighting system. Headquartered in France, with stores throughout Europe, Latin America and China, Carrefour is one of the world’s largest retailers, earning more than $134 billion in revenue in 2010. In 1963, Carrefour opened its first hypermarket, a combination grocery store and department store designed to be a one-stop-shop for those buying food, clothes and home goods. More than 50 years and 15,000 stores later, Carrefour launched a revised version of its hypermarket concept, dubbed Planet Carrefour.

Each Planet Carrefour store is outfitted with more than 2,000 SunLux LED lighting fixtures. LED lights not only provide substantial energy savings over the fluorescent lighting typically found in stores, but also emit neither heat nor UV to better preserve the quality of the store’s products.

In order for LED lighting to be a viable option for the stores, Carrefour needed its lights to have cooling capabilities that allowed the SunLux LEDs to run at a higher lumen output, while looking attractive and without detracting from the LEDs life-span.

Solution:

SynJet is the most effective LED thermal management solution available. By delivering targeted pulses of air directly to the LED system’s heat sink, the SynJet is able to cool more effectively, allowing Planet Carrefour’s LED lights to run two times brighter and last longer all while enabling a dramatic reduction in energy costs. Furthermore, SynJet’s cooling allows for a more consistent level of lighting with a temperature color that doesn’t very over time – both key benefits to better present the stores’ merchandise.For this, Carrefour turned to Nuventix’s SynJet thermal management technology.

The two new Planet Carrefour stores opened on August 25, 2010 to much fanfare and praise. As a new customer exclaimed, “This is completely different. This is more clear, more clean and everything is visible. It’s super.” The LED lighting has been so successful, Carrefour is now integrating it into additional stores throughout Europe and beyond using SunLux’ standardized, interchangeable fixtures.Carrefour also chose to use SynJet because of the cooling module’s reliability. SynJet modules are the only active cooling option that matches – and exceeds – the life of the LEDs themselves – up to 100,000 hours of run time. SynJet’s patented oscillating diaphragm design is frictionless. There are no components or ball bearings to wear out and breakdown, making SynJet durable, reliable, and further ensuring SunLux’ average LED lifespan of 50,000 hours (more than 10 years). With SunLux LED lighting, cooled by SynJet thermal management solutions, Carrefour engineers save huge amounts of money and time on maintenance costs.