Flicker distortion power factor analysis in lighting LED's

We are living today a fast transition in lighting systems from classical filament lamps or more economical halogen lamps and CFL (Compact Fluorescent Lamp) to Solid State Lighting (SSL), which is in fact based on LEDs. In the same time, beside incomparable advantages in energy savings and multiple control possibilities, the massive introduction of solid state lighting will cause major disturbances in the power grid networks. These disturbances are an effect of harmonics present in the voltage and current of the network, as a direct cause of non-sinusoidal waveforms of these quantities. We present in the paper quantitative investigations on distorted sinusoidal regime for LEDs and different lamps, based on a proprietary FFT algorithm, intended to offer useful information regarding the presence of harmonics. For a quick comparison of complex distortion effects, a procedure to calculate the global power factor is employed. We will present also the effect of dimming process on light flicker, situation in which the distortion is produced by simultaneously distortion of LED voltage and current.