Power management chips help meet Chinese standards

Power Integrations has confirmed that its high-voltage integrated circuits will help manufacturers to comply with recently released Chinese energy-efficiency standards.

Power Integrations has confirmed that its high-voltage integrated circuits enable manufacturers to comply with energy-efficiency standards issued recently by the China Certification centre for Energy Conservation Products (CECP).

The new standards address the energy consumption of external power supplies - the chargers and adapters that power cellphones, portable music players, digital cameras, cordless phones, portable games and many other devices.

The CECP standards are harmonised with standards implemented in recent months by the California Energy Commission (CEC), Energy Star and the European Union.

Like Energy Star, the CECP conducts a voluntary programme offering manufacturers incentives to produce environmentally friendly products.

The standards include minimum operating-efficiency requirements at various levels of output power, and impose a maximum level of "no-load" power consumption.

The standards effectively rule out the use of linear transformers, the highly inefficient copper-and-iron power supplies commonly sold as external adapters with many electronic devices.

"The effort to rid the world of the wasteful power supplies known as 'energy vampires' has gained considerable momentum in recent months", noted Balu Balakrishnan, President and CEO of Power Integrations.

"Policy makers in many of the world's largest markets, including China, have coalesced around a common set of efficiency standards that essentially rule out the use of linear transformers in external power supplies".

"Power Integrations' LinkSwitch ICs are specifically tailored for the replacement of low-power linear transformers", continued Balakrishnan.

"No other solution offers the same combination of cost-effectiveness, ease of design and integrated safety features such as hysteretic thermal shutdown and overvoltage protection".

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