Big LED Breakthrough at Purdue University Could Change the World
Found this over on TreeHugger
Better, Cheaper LEDs
The incandescent lightbulb that wastes 90% of the electricity as heat is dying, we all know that. But a new breakthrough in solid state lighting might also kill compact fluorescent lightbulbs (CFLs) faster than some expected. Scientists at Purdue University have figured out how to manufacture LED solid-state lights on regular metal-coated silicon wafers (more details below). What this means is: much lower costs.10% Reduction in Total Electricity Use
And since about 1/3 of U.S. electricity is used to produce light, this is major. “If you replaced existing lighting with solid-state lighting, following some reasonable estimates for the penetration of that technology based on economics and other factors, it could reduce the amount of energy we consume for lighting by about one-third. That represents a 10 percent reduction of electricity consumption and a comparable reduction of related carbon emissions,” said Timothy D. Sands, professor of Materials Engineering and Electrical and Computer Engineering states at Purdue.
Old LEDs vs. New LEDs
What makes traditional LEDs so expensive is that the light-emitting layer of an LED light is a gallium nitride crystal and it needs to be treated in various ways with expensive materials.Dailytech:
In sapphire based LEDs, used for green or blue lighting, mirror-like reflectors are need to reflect and resend emitted light, increasing the efficiency. Typically, this layer is extremely expensive to produce, part of the reason the current generation of LED lighting costs so much, costing at least 20 times more than conventional incandescent and fluorescent bulbs. Also, the LEDs are built on sapphire crystals, which provide the color, but are extremely expensive.
But the new LEDs can be made using standard silicon wafers and already existing, less expensive, processes. This would make them competitive with incandescent and CFLs.
The new techniques yield a crystalline structure aligned to the crystalline silicon. This means that the LEDs are less prone to defects and will perform more efficiently [...] silicon dissipates heat more effectively than sapphires. This will reduce damage during operation and lead to longer lifetimes and more reliability..
We might soon have to get used to changing lightbulbs every other decade.
LEDs that are currently available convert electricity to light with an efficiency of 47 to 64%. It is predicted that LED produced with Purdue’s process would have an efficiency in the high-end of that range, compared to about 10% for incandescent.
High Powered LED Floor Lamps light your home, and save the environment!
Found this over on Metaefficient. Nice looking lamps, a little doctor’s office, sterile looking for me, but I assume this keeps manufacturing costs down. Great lamps and look like they spread a lot of light around too. Great for reading lamps, I swear LED lamps are the best to read by instead of halogen.
Here’s the article.
Koncept has released a new series of their I-Tower LED floor lamps. It’s good LED floor lamps becoming widely available. These lamps use the latest generation of high-power LEDs, which means they are brighter than the older I-Tower lamps, but they actually uses less power (8.8 watts). There are two models: a daylight version (~5500 Kelvin) and a warm-white version (~3500 Kelvin). The lamps have a built-in 4 step dimmer. Koncept says the lifespan of these lamps is “at least 40,000 operating hours”. They are available from Amazon for $154.
Ladies and Gentlemen, we now have a functional OLED lamp for Home use from Ingo Maurer
Found this over on Inhabitat today via Ecogeek.com. This is very cool, I for one am looking forward to more technology like this before I think about building a house so I can have solar/wind/water power instead of using hydro.
Exciting times.. read on..
It’s an exciting time for OLED technology as it finally begins to integrate into the home and designers start to realize its potential for efficient and inexpensive lighting solutions in a variety of stunning new applications. Resembling a tiny tree blossoming with lucent leaves, Ingo Maurer’s Early Future lamp is the world’s first to pack energy efficient OLED lighting into a tabletop form factor.
Organic light emitting diodes are incredibly energy efficient, long lasting, and can be produced on the cheap as evinced by GE’s recently rolled out OLED printing system. The two-dimensional panels emit broad swathes of diffuse light that is perfect for interior lighting applications, and they can even be rendered in a flexible format.
Ingo Maurer states: “They have a totally different look than traditional light sources. They neither require reflectors directing the light into the right direction nor large sockets. Their lightness allows the realisation of long-standing visions of mine”.
The Early Future lamp is the crowning achievement of Maurer’s artistic innovation and Osram’s team of 50 research engineers dedicated to the development of OLED technology. It features an elegant array of ten small (132 x 33 mm) OLED panels, and Maurer states that it “represents an important stage in the transition from abstract object to functional designer lighting”. The designer’s name and artistic acclaim are bringing to bear a hefty price tag for the lamp, but it’s a striking proof of concept that will hopefully light the way towards future innovations.
+ Osram
Photo source: Ingo Maurer/OSRAM
Via ecogeek.com
Led Project By Pulsar – The Halation – Brings Outdoor Lighting to Historical Areas
Simon Watkinson’s Halation project provides 18-month visitor attraction at Southampton heritage site
Southampton City Council has launched its spectacular Halation project, illuminating the city’s historic 600 year-old High Arcades along Western Esplanade with colour-changing linear LED strips from Pulsar Light.
The initiative to highlight Southampton’s five medieval arches near the waterfront is the result of collaboration between lighting artist Simon Watkinson and Southampton City Council, under public arts officer Liz Smith. Costing £74,000 to stage, the project — part of the Southampton Public Art Strategy initiative — has been funded by the Area Investment Framework (AIF) and rubber-stamped by the South East England Development Agency (SEEDA) and Southampton Partnership. Halation will run for a minimum of 18 months.
Tyneside-based Simon Watkinson’s work (largely within the Old Town walls) is already familiar to the Southampton community, and he has turned frequently in the past to the local branch of Stage Electrics to help realise his ambitions.
This time the challenge was to soften the arches using lighting strips fixed to metalwork — designed to simulate the timber frame construction that was a feature of Southampton’s Old Town. The metalwork ‘arms’ in turn create three ‘virtual’ arches within the five-arch superstructure, enabling the artist to mount a mesmerising stained-glass effect.
Acting as project manager, Stage Electrics’ Business Development Manager, Ed Gamble, considered how the artist’s concept might be implemented, and proposed 55 lengths of ChromaStrip X3, Pulsar’s IP65-rated RGB linear LED strips, driven over a 7-minute time cycle by a series Pulsar ChromaZone RMX3 operating under generic DMX control.
He said, “We went to Pulsar because we are familiar with the product, we know it is IP-rated and we know we can support it as the back-up is excellent. On top of that it has a very accurate beam angle of 45° so there is no overspill between the segments.”
Handling the DMX distribution from the master position in the central arcade is a concealed Swisson device — part of a range of DMX manipulation and sine-wave dimming products from the Swiss manufacturer which Stage Electrics represents in the UK.
The two criteria which the installation needed to meet were speed and sensitivity. In view of its heritage the work had to be carried out under the close scrutiny of English Heritage and be non-invasive. Thus it required its own ground support — the structure sitting on a 600mm x 600mm x 300mm concrete pad — covered by ballast, and had to be completely self-supporting.
With the control gear likewise concealed in metal boxes, the metal infrastructure was fabricated and installed by local company Scroll Gates, with 8 x 900mm 1W ChromaStrips and 3 x 600mm 1W strips affixed to the metalwork frame in each of the five arches.
This provides the capacity for a near infinite number of colour combinations which have been programmed into the seven-minute sequence by Steve Brown.
Simon Watkinson explained that the installation had to be carried out “at breakneck speed” — views echoed by Ed Gamble and Liz Smith. A project that would generally require at least six months to co-ordinate in the event was delivered in two and a half months, they said.
One of the biggest draws on both time and budget had been bringing the power to the site, enabling the feature to be activated nightly via photo-cell (a solar time clock) and switched off at 1am.
As for Simon Watkinson, he explained, “There was nothing psychological about the colour sequencing — although it is possibly thematic in relation to the sea, and also brings out the heraldic qualities. It is mostly based on the visual impression of stained glass and the shifting quality of the light.”
The structure itself had been derived from Southampton’s timber-frame heritage (particularly in the archaeologically-rich French Quarter) and this had provided the inspiration for the stained glass effect. “The walls have gone through a lot of permutations and I wanted Halation to emphasise these changes rather than be presented as a solid stone structure; the stained glass effect lessens the weight and creates new depths to the spaces. The idea was always to make it striking and simple, and I’m absolutely delighted with the result.”
Equally delighted is Liz Smith. “We had wanted to focus on the Old Town and its historic values, and this has become of huge heritage interest.
“I think it’s a credit to the project team that we were able to pull it off in such a short period of time. We are delighted with the result, and I must say it has been great working with Stage Electrics and our own ground crew, led by Allen Miles.”
Commission:
Southampton City Council Public Art Strategy – www.southampton.gov.uk
Lighting Design:
Simon Watkinson – simon@simonwatkinson.com
LED Lighting:
Stage Electrics – www.stage-electrics.co.uk
Lighting Equipment:
55 Pulsar ChromaStrip X3, 5 ChromaZone RMX3 – www.pulsarlight.com
For further information, please contact www.pulsarlight.com
LED and OLED Home Lighting Systems Almost Ready for Prime Time
Found on Tree Hugger
Photo credit: matthewvenn
Today’s New York Times has a special section on innovation in technology, and among the things they see in their crystal ball is LED and OLED lighting systems for the home. Just around the corner, just about within reach.
The technology has been on the horizon for awhile now — we’ve seen a sprinkling of LED bulbs and lamps, and have been tracking the development of OLEDs (that’s organic light emitting diodes) with interest — and, as with many technological innovations, they’re a little buggy and a little (or a lot) spendy early in their development. But they’re getting some help; according to the article, “the Department of Energy is financing projects to overcome technical and marketing problems that have prevented the technology from successfully challenging more conventional incandescent and fluorescent lighting.”
Among their charms, LEDs and OLEDs have a nearly unlimited ability to be fine-tuned, allowing for things like improved light quality and focused directional light, and, perhaps most notably, are much more energy efficient than their incandescent and compact fluorescent counterparts.
Still, there’s a ways to go before we can expect to have an LED bulb in every socket, or an OLED in every panel or light box. Cost and light diffusion are two obstacles keeping the technologies from flooding the market, but that’s slowly changing; LEDs are finding their place as a replacement for halogen bulbs, and better diffusers are making them more viable as incandescent and CFL replacements. When will this happen? The crystal ball is a bit murky on this one, but it appears that the future of LEDs and OLEDs is brighter than ever. ::New York Times
Ned LED Task Light from Pablo Designs
Found on TreeHugger..
Combining precise control with some pretty suave looks and the efficiency of LEDs, Pablo Designs’ Brazo task lamp proves we can have our cake and eat it, too. The desk lamp has 18 fully dimmable LEDs in a tube that rotates 360 degrees, meaning you can have just as much light as you want, just about wherever you want it. The super-efficient LEDs — the exact energy consumption isn’t listed, oddly — are rated for 25,000 hours of life.
Designed by Pablo Pardo, the futuristic-looking lamp carries an equally futuristic price tag of $400 — ouch! Being an early adopter has a price — but we like all the different options the dimming and twisting provide. And to help reduce the sticker shock just a bit, remember that you’d probably buy and burn out 25 or 30 incandescent light bulbs in those 25,000 hours (we know, small consolation). Get all the specs [PDF] on the slick lamp, join us in waiting for the price to come down, and hit the jump to get up close and personal. ::Pablo Designs via ::Organic Spa Magazine and check out a great hands-on review over at ::Jetson Green
Cheap LEDs could power much of Africa, and beyond.
Coupled with the previous post from Inhabitat, there was also another article on there today that caught our eye. It seems that Popular Mechanics is even jumping on with the benefits of LED Lights, not only for christmas lights and new LED lamps, but now for global aide. LED’s provide a great, cheap (in the long run) source of lighting for lesser developed nations. Plus, with the added benefit that many of these nations are under constant sun, Solar power can be used to power much of them, or recharge the batteries for night time use. Talk about environmental eh?
From the article ..
We love our LEDs for lamps and Christmas lights, but there’s a global application for LEDs that could bring inexpensive and efficient light to the 75% of Africa that lacks dependable access to clean, safe electrical lighting. (In Sub-Saharan Africa over 500 million people presently lack modern energy, and rural electricity access rates is only 2%.) A $13 million World Bank Group Initiative called Lighting Africa was launched in September 2007 to develop and distribute a highly efficient and rugged LED light bulb for the electricity-deprived in Africa.
Evan Mills, a researcher with California’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, is the man who helped write the proposal which led to Lighting Africa. He has laid emphasis on the use of light-emitting diodes (LEDs) as the affordable source of lighting in Africa. The principles of producing light are different in an incandescent bulb (contains a filament that emits heat, some of which is visible), a CFL (emits light when charged mercury vapor excites the bulb’s phosphorus coating), and an LED. The process used by LEDs is different from the two: here electrons are converted directly to light-emitting photons. The process is cleaner, and does not pose risks associated with disposal of mercury in CFLs.
The researchers at the California Lighting Technology Center at the University of California, Davis, are working towards increasing the lumens per watt from LEDs to increase efficiency. In order to exploit LEDs in best possible way for African conditions they would be integrated with best optics, rechargeable batteries and charging systems, and housed in a casing that could last years.
Lighting Africa is also aiming to bring down the cost of developing LEDs; it would award 20 grants of up to $200,000 to companies and institutions. The whole endeavor would serve several goods at once: provide affordable light to the people in Africa, try to mitigate the problems associated with disposal of mercury in CFLs, reduce the use of kerosene, which, in turn, would reduce pollution; and give social justice as Evan Mills says, “The number of people without adequate light is greater than the entire world population when Edison invented the light bulb.”
Natures Tough Little Swimmers Intensify LED Light.. Literally
Salmon are commonly known as one of the stronger swimmers in the animal kingdom, now it turns out their little man army can also increase the output of LEDs… as engadget displays
below..
See, the problem with bioengineering isn’t moral or ethical dilemmas, or even homicidal robo-droids enslaving humanity. It’s that if you let researchers go wild, eventually they’ll find a way to make LEDs out of salmon sperm, threatening the sanctity (and sperm-free-ness) of your entire gadget-based lifestyle. Yet that’s exactly what Professor Andrew Steckl of the University of Cincinnati has managed to do, using the DNA found in salmon sperm to enhance the brightness of LEDs. The so-called BioLEDs are being developed in cooperation with the Air Force (yes, the Air Force — they had a “good source” of salmon sperm, apparently) and they’ve been so successful that Steckl has been getting salmon sperm from researchers worldwide “wanting to see if their sperm is good enough.” Steckl says that since salmon sperm is considered a waste product of the fishing industry, BioLEDs are particularly green — kind of like our faces right now.