By Deb Lovig

We LED folks love our industry and we also dig cool stuff related to LEDs. Setting rockin’ flashlights aside for a moment, let’s talk Ts.

Our friends at UnScrewAmerica.com have just the type of creative genus that desires mention. Visit the site, but more importantly get the shirt: LEDs Rock. You’ll love the look and feel and darned if you don’t receive admiring remarks every time you wear it. Seriously.

And, no, they are not backlit with LEDs. They’re not that geeky…but that might be kinda cool. You can purchase them at toporanch.com, another creator of incredibly cool, genius T-shirts.

Hey, and if you get the shirt and rig it with a white LED or two, send us a photo!

By Deb Lovig

In a meeting recently I was asked what I thought is the “killer app” for LED lighting. Or rather, what needs to happen to get an LED in every grocery cart?

Glad they asked because my 11-year-old had just asked for a project idea. Something that would require him to do research, create a 3D drawing and write a report. Once I recovered from the shock of hearing the word “write” coming from his mouth (he occasionally writes more than three words at a time and isn’t much concerned with punctuation…), I got serious.

All I could think at that moment was, “What would it take to get my mom, our neighbor’s aunt and most high school band instructors to switch to LED lighting?” No hesitation – an LED bulb that screws into a typical Edison socket and provides the same type and amount of light as a 60-watt incandescent bulb.

You can buy LED bulbs in the store and on the Web that at least look like a 60-watt light bulb. Unfortunately, except for a few, they are mostly too dim or bluish, or worse, flicker and then go out for good. I blew one out pretty quickly in a desk lamp belonging to our accommodating CFO.

Lots of companies and inventors are working on this, so my son has plenty of competition. The Department of Energy is so hyped on this task that it is offering up some heavy change in the form the L-Prize competition. The winner comes away with $10 million in awards and purchasing agreements and massive bragging rights. http://www.lightingprize.org/

As for my son? That’s a whole lot of cash so he’s thinking, drawing and making 3D LEGO models just as fast as he can. I’m just glad the LED light bulb has replaced his frustrated attempts to make hovercraft the new Prius.

By Deb Lovig

When we first started talking to cities about LED lighting in 2006, few knew anything about LEDs, so we pretty much started at the beginning: “LED lighting is really efficient, it lasts a long time, it doesn’t contain mercury and it can save a lot of energy and money.” We stated the facts and went on to talk about which applications were LED-ready, how to develop a total cost of ownership business case and how to get a pilot started.

Three years later, we are hearing something a little different. More than a few people we talk with think they know about LED lighting but actually have their facts on LED lighting, well, wrong.

My first recollection of misinformation revolved around the hoaxes Colonel Hogan and crew hatched to flummox the hapless Sgt.  Shultz on Hogan’s Heroes. Sgt. Schultz was regularly led astray with an outrageous story Hogan whispered to him, although Hogan and his crew obviously never succeeded in breaking out of the POW camp.

Yep. I’m implying that you might be given misinformation on purpose. Or, some folks might have made some guesses based on a few truths they do know and gotten it wrong. Either way, we want to help.

Here are a few of the touted facts I’ve heard that are misinformation:

Example: LED lighting is not ready today for street lighting and parking garages because LEDs generate so much more heat than traditional light sources that they have to be in air conditioned sites.

Wrong: LEDs generate far less heat than traditional lights sources and they are working especially well in street and parking lot applications. As a side note, because they generate less heat, you need LESS air conditioning to keep folks in your building comfortable.

Example: LED lights are very hard to install.

Wrong: LED fixtures and bulbs should be as easy to install as traditional light sources. Your installers or electricians should be wowed by how fabulous they are to install and operate. If not, something’s fishy.

Example: LED lights don’t work well in cold environments.

Wrong: LEDs work a whole lot better than traditional lights sources in cold. In fact, they love cold and they don’t need several minutes to warm up to reach full output, either.

Example: LED manufacturers don’t provide warranties on their products.

Wrong: The good ones do. Ask to be sure before you buy. If you can’t get a decent warranty, move on to a different vendor.

Example: We bought a few fixtures from the web and they don’t work very well. Must be the LEDs.

Wrong: Like any lighting product, LED lighting systems must be built with high-quality, high-performance components and must be designed to produce the right color and spread for the application you wish to illuminate.

Stay tuned for my “Don’t Google for LEDs” post… There are many very good LED lights available today and quite a few really bad products. Use our Questions to Ask Chart to help you weed out the bad lights.

By Deb Lovig

As the LED industry grows by leaps and bounds, it’s kinda hard to remember back to the good old days when there were a few really smart guys who were mostly just trying to outgun each other on brightness and efficiency. Back when LEDs were indicator and dashboard lights, and mostly red or yellow, a not-so-mad scientist came along who would make a blue LED bright enough to be useful. Bright enough that others would buy these LEDs in large quantities and start to make blue indicators and dashboards.

 John Edmond is quick to point out that he didn’t know what an LED was when he was hired as the third Cree employee and assigned to make LEDs. That was back in 1987 and a lot has changed since Cree’s performance breakthrough in 1989 that enabled the commercialization of the blue LED. One of Cree’s first big customers for blue LEDs was Volkswagon. They began buying blue LEDs in 1995 for what is now Volkswagon’s signature blue dashboard.

 Today, the blue LED is the foundation for super bright white LED light, which is revolutionizing the way the world thinks about lighting.

 Amazingly enough, Dr. Edmond is still at Cree, still busting through performance hurdles and still loving his work. When they meet John, most people ask him why he still does what he does. He’s got more than 20 years of major accomplishments attached to his name. His kids are off doing their own things. He prefers to spend summers in upstate New York. So, why not cut loose and leave the labs behind?

 “I’m as excited about the state of LEDs as I’ve ever been. We are at the point that we are starting to see LEDs in our offices, on our streets and in our homes. This is what I’ve been working toward for the past 20 some years. It’s just getting more exciting,” says John. “I can now say that I believe we will see 200 lumens per watt from LEDs and I would never have believed that when we first started. It’s just crazy fun no matter where you are in the LED industry.”

Here’s a recent interview with John during which he talks about the early days of Cree and the commercialization of the blue LED: