Tuesday, July 24, 2012

The state of solid state (LED) lighting

The state of solid state (LED) lighting:
This post is sponsored by Super Bright LEDs
According to the U.S Department of Energy:
Widespread use of LED lighting has the greatest potential impact on energy savings in the United States. By 2027, widespread use of LEDs could save about 348 TWh (compared to no LED use) of electricity: This is the equivalent annual electrical output of 44 large electric power plants (1000 megawatts each), and a total savings of more than $30 billion at today’s electricity prices.
Okay, I get it. They’re environmentally friendly.
But those little dome-shaped diodes are dim, and pretty much useless for lighting anything but that old Casio watch you have sitting in your drawer, right?
Wrong.
Scientists have achieved incredible advancements in LED technology over the past decade, making it a viable replacement for standard lighting — and what’s more, a valuable weapon in the fight to save our planet.
This year marks the 50th anniversary of LED technology, and it has been an incredible journey. From those early devices that barely put out any light at all (yet cost hundreds of dollars) — to the present day, where you can light a building for as little as $3 per LED.
As you probably know, LEDs have an incredibly long life. How long?
A typical 60W incandescent bulb will last around 1,000 hours. Compare that to a 60W (equivalent) LED bulb that will provide light for approximately 40,000 hours.
To put that into perspective, if you put one of these high tech LED bulbs in your newborn’s room and use it four hours every day, it will still be going strong when that child is 27 (if he or she sticks around your house that long, but that’s another issue).
Think about that.
Today, LEDs have come a long way from a time when they were simply indicator lights on electronics. These high tech lighting devices are illuminating everything from cell phone screens to basketball arenas. Most modern standard lighting LED replacement products utilize a new type of LED, known as a high-powered or SMD LED.
These products are being used to replace an incredible variety of applications where incandescent or fluorescent bulbs were once used. Here are just a few popular products that serve as examples of how LEDs are infiltrating the current lighting market:
LED Strips
This incredible innovation consists of high-powered LEDs, mounted on a super thin flexible circuit board with an adhesive backing.
LED strip products can flex and adhere to just about anything, making them useful in an incredibly large assortment of applications — from under cabinet lighting, to automotive or home accent lighting. Recently, a few strip products that produce enough lumens to act as general lighting for an entire room have hit the market.
Standard Replacement Lighting
These LED bulbs are basically a standard base type (including A19, PAR, MR) with any number of LEDs producing the light. Sometimes described as looking “futuristic,” they aim to produce similar light (as far as intensity and color) as the standard incandescent or florescent lighting they replace.
Automotive Lighting
Many major automotive manufacturers have seen the light (so to speak) and are starting to implement LED lighting on their higher end vehicles.
LEDs are great for vehicle lighting due to their vibrant bright color and fast turn-on times.
And if your vehicle didn’t come standard with LED lighting, there are a wide variety of quality LED car lights available from vendors. You can retrofit your outdated incandescent lighting with new high-tech LED automotive bulbs.
As you can see, LED technology has come a long way in the past 50 years, finally emerging as a vital part of the mainstream lighting market.
This is no longer a small niche industry.
It is a business that uses lighting to help a wide range of customers improve their product or service. From construction, to theater, to law enforcement — more and more enterprises are adopting efficient LED lights as their preferred lighting source.
Which is good news for their pocketbooks as well as for the environment.

2 comments:

  1. Unlike the other light sources, LED can easily be produced and its functions can be controlled with a processor to achieve unique lighting effects.

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  2. very nice article, gained a lot from it.



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