# Popular Mechanics -- The Future of LED Lights



## laur (Jan 28, 2010)

This is an article I just read in Popular Mechanics. Here is the opening paragraph:

"17 Projects Shaping the Future of LED Lights
Solid-state lighting holds the promise of huge energy savings and long-lasting light sources. But before it comes to market, the products, like LED lights, have to get better, cheaper and easier to make. Here's how the U.S. Department of Energy is investing in a future illuminated by light-emitting diodes (LEDs) and organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs)."

and here is the website for the rest of the article:

http://www.popularmechanics.com/home_journal/home_improvement/4343724.html

Enjoy
laur


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## laur (Feb 2, 2010)

For anyone who has not read the interesting article about the future of LED's. Just a bump to send it to the top.

laur


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## Inkidu (Mar 30, 2010)

I found this interesting.


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## jason 77 (Apr 1, 2010)

I can see the WhiteOptics web page but can't figure out where to actually buy some of there product... All the listed "sellers" seem to not carry any of the WhiteOptics products?


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## Monolith (Apr 1, 2010)

Seems the Korean government is a little more serious about LEDs:


*[FONT=&quot]Korean Government Investing[/FONT]**[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]**[FONT=&quot]KRW 150 billion into LED Industry[/FONT]*​ [FONT=&quot] 
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Over the next two years, the Korean government plans to invest KRW 150 billion (approximately US$130 million) to promote the Korean LED industry, _e.g._, developing high efficiency lighting products to be on par with products [/FONT][FONT=&quot]from advanced nations. Further, by enacting the Industry Convergence Promotion Act, the government will support the convergence and integration of technologies between new industries and established industries.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]The government plans to distribute more information about LED lights and will publish the performance test results of certified high-efficiency products available in the market. A LED lighting test center will be established in the Korean Photonics Technology Institute in Gwangju, Korea. Also, beginning in March 2010, the government plans to implement measures to encourage public organizations to use certified LED lights. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]The Minister of Knowledge Economy, Kyunghwan Choi, stated that “convergence” is the key word for the LED industry to create new growth engines. He also stated that by enacting the Industry Convergence Promotion Act, the government will support the convergence of the LED business and will not allow the release of new convergence products to be delayed due to the lack of standards. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]March 19, 2010 ETNEWS[/FONT]


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## was.lost.but.now.found (Apr 1, 2010)

It's interesting they mentioned the whole heat going out the back idea. While that is absolutely true, there is SOME heat that comes out the front. I never realized this until I got my TK40. I'd shine it at my hand on turbo and feel heat. I was like "whoa". I put a thermometer in front of the thing and sure enough you can see the temp rise right in front of your eyes.


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## uk_caver (Apr 4, 2010)

There's _energy_ going out of the front.
Even if it's all IR-free light, it can still heat things up, including hands and thermometers.


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## brickbat (Apr 5, 2010)

laur said:


> ...Here's how the U.S. Department of Energy is investing in a future illuminated by light-emitting diodes...




No. The US department of energy has no assets to "invest" in this technology. What they can do, however, is send my tax dollars to institutions and companies they deem worthy to receive them. And, quite frankly, I have no confidence in their "investing" skills...

Grrr.....

My opinion is that LED lighting is destined to take over many lighting applications in good time. Why must it be subsidized? The US government didn't have to subsidize Thomas Edison!


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## AnAppleSnail (Apr 5, 2010)

brickbat said:


> Why must it be subsidized? The US government didn't have to subsidize Thomas Edison!



My tentative guess is that they'd like to encourage companies to innovate here rather than in other places. By making funding available to start new companies, or by "encouraging" larger ones to build research laboratories in the US, there's the hope of jobs/innovation/etc. It would be pretty neat to have a decent revamping of the Edison lightbulb format created here. The thing is such a pain for solid-state lighting...

Economically speaking, there are other payoffs than just money. It's easy to count dollars and cents with the power bill of CFLs versus incandescents, but there's another difference - the carbon footprint. Maybe that's not worth a thing to you, but the power company (or at least the government) would like to reduce power usage.

At my college, quite a lot of state money goes to subsidize education and research, and the economists (Educated at these state universities, so add plenty of salt) tell us it's a 20-fold return on the investment. Consider what can be done with these better LEDs - if you had a rice-grain sized thing that gave 10 high-CRI lumens from 30 mA, along with effective wireless power, then suddenly you have a revolution in home lighting. 


PS: Is this a  of blood, or of fire? Someone reading over my shoulder asked.


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## blasterman (Apr 5, 2010)

> At my college, quite a lot of state money goes to subsidize education and research, and the economists....tell us it's a 20-fold return on the investment.


 
No arguement - that's a good investment.

The problem here is that more than enough LED research is 'street' ready, but the main problem is education and consumer habits. It's not the purpose of research grants to come up with improved ways for fat and lazy Western consumers to more efficiently buy junk LED retrofits from China, and then complain they aren't very bright or reliable. That in a nutshell, is a far bigger problem.



> Maybe that's not worth a thing to you, but the power company (or at least the government) would like to reduce power usage.


 
I'm convinced that projected residential lighting power consumption is a bit inflated, but the point is made. Again, the problem is not a matter of improved lighting technology, but obsolete building codes and bad consumer habits. Rather than replace all the bulbs in the basement ceiling with unreliable Walmart CFLs, why not flip the damn light switch off when going upstairs?


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## vaska (Apr 5, 2010)

blasterman said:


> why not flip the damn light switch off when going upstairs?


 
Try to explain this to my wife and kids


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## brickbat (Apr 5, 2010)

blasterman said:


> ...Rather than replace all the bulbs in the basement ceiling with unreliable Walmart CFLs, why not flip the damn light switch off when going upstairs?



Not to worry. I'm sure the government will soon step in and mandate that all basement light fixtures be equipped with occupancy sensors


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## was.lost.but.now.found (Apr 6, 2010)

brickbat said:


> Not to worry. I'm sure the government will soon step in and mandate that all basement light fixtures be equipped with occupancy sensors


 
That's two political posts from you; please don't get this thread closed, mmkay? If you just can't help yourself then go check out the Underground, where this stuff belongs.


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## Canuke (Apr 6, 2010)

was.lost.but.now.found said:


> That's two political posts from you; please don't get this thread closed, mmkay? If you just can't help yourself then go check out the Underground, where this stuff belongs.



Well, there's the rub right there; the more government gets involved with everything, the harder it gets to make statements about things that aren't somehow "political"...


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## Ken_McE (Apr 6, 2010)

Canuke said:


> Well, there's the rub right there; the more government gets involved with everything, the harder it gets to make statements about things that aren't somehow "political"...



You can make all the political statements you like, at least around here. However they are off topic for the Flashlights/LED forum. 

Got any opinions about the future of LED lighting maybe?


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## AnAppleSnail (Sep 27, 2012)

Ken_McE said:


> You can make all the political statements you like, at least around here. However they are off topic for the Flashlights/LED forum.
> 
> Got any opinions about the future of LED lighting maybe?



Brighter, cheaper, and more common.


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## smokinbasser (Sep 27, 2012)

I'm fairly certain power companies WANT you to use more power so they make more $$$$$$$$$$$


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## StarHalo (Sep 27, 2012)

AnAppleSnail said:


> Brighter, cheaper, and more common.



Not fair, since you're technically replying from the future. Good necro-bump though.

Should also mention:

- Roughly 10% of a power station's output goes to residential use; if during a summertime power alert you completely cut off and blacked out all the residential grids, that would only reduce power consumption by 10%.

- Roughly 10% of your electricity use is lighting, and it's lower than that if you've made an effort to use efficient bulbs. So if you walked around in the dark for a month using only flashlights at night, your bill would only be 10% less.

- Therefore only 1% of a power plant's output goes towards residential lighting. If all the homes connected to a specific plant went without lighting for a month, there would be no statistically evident change in overall monthly power consumption.


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## AnAppleSnail (Sep 27, 2012)

StarHalo said:


> Not fair, since you're technically replying from the future. Good necro-bump though.
> 
> Should also mention:...No statistically evident change in overall monthly power consumption.



I love time travel! However, some industrial use is lighting - in factories and streets. I'll poke our accountant and ask how much we burn. Relamping to LEDs will mostly save us relamping costs, but there is also power to consider since we run 24/7/52. It's probably a bit different than housing. The room outside my office has about 90 400-w metal halide bulbs over 110 2kW machines. Changing these to Dialight units will pay off the CAPEX in a few years, but that's saving high-boom relampings, using a rebate, and saving power constantly.



Edit:


smokinbasser said:


> I'm fairly certain power companies WANT you to use more power so they make more $$$$$$$$$$$



That's not exactly how companies make more money. For example, we make widgets in massive quantities. We consume about ten million meters of yarn every day. Our suppliers don't really want us to put their yarn in a bonfire and ask for more. Their margins are so low that they don't make very much money on yarn, and upgrading their factories to supply our bonfires will require a huge outlay of money that won't pay off soon. If they take a bet and step up capacity (As power plant operators did in the 70s and 80s) then they have to have a strong case just to get that money from a bank, much less to pay it off. Well, in the 80s the US emphasized efficiency and scrapped a few hundred planned power plants - ten of which were more than half finished nuclear plants - I do not know the numbers for oil and coal. Their reward isn't in wasting power - it's in feeding the addiction and keeping their margins present. No huge outlays to build more plants, and no sudden changes to their environment.


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## sidecross (Sep 27, 2012)

"...Most data centers, by design, consume vast amounts of energy in an incongruously 
wasteful manner, interviews and documents show. Online companies typically run 
their facilities at maximum capacity around the clock, whatever the demand. As a 
result, data centers can waste 90 percent or more of the electricity they pull 
off the grid, The Times found..."

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/23/t...gy-belying-industry-image.html?pagewanted=all

When all fosil fuels are gone where are they going to go to 'plug in'?


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## IMSabbel (Sep 27, 2012)

StarHalo said:


> Not fair, since you're technically replying from the future. Good necro-bump though.
> 
> Should also mention:
> 
> ...



The us government disagrees with your assumptions. Not only homes are illuminated, also offices and factories.

In 2010, ca 18% of the commercial and residential energy consumption was lighting, and 13% of the total, overall, all included cosumption (http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=99&t=3).

Also, about 40% of the total electricity ends up in residential consumption (http://www.eia.gov/totalenergy/data/annual/showtext.cfm?t=ptb0809= ), which makes home lighting >7% of the total electricity consumtion, a factor of 7 higher than you gauge (also, I venture the guess that in the evenings, after office hours and with people needing light at home it could be >30%)


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## AnAppleSnail (Sep 27, 2012)

sidecross said:


> "...Most data centers, by design, consume vast amounts of energy in an incongruously
> wasteful manner, interviews and documents show. Online companies typically run
> their facilities at maximum capacity around the clock, whatever the demand. As a
> result, data centers can waste 90 percent or more of the electricity they pull
> ...


See what happens when the uneducated write scare tech articles? Claiming that ”six percent” of power is used carries little value when the rest is needed to ensure the data center remains reliable. Ask your nearest data center our server admin what happens without power to back up data and processes. Trimming those is about like a doctor asking if you REALLY want sterile scalpels this time.


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## Bullzeyebill (Sep 27, 2012)

Not sure it was a good idea to bump this thread. In fact, let's close it. Before it was bumped, this thread was heading toward political commentary, and a recommendation was made by a member to continue it in the Underground.

Bill


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