Strategies in Light Kicks Off 2008 Conference

When it comes to USA-based conferences serving the global LED industry, Strategies in Light defines the space. The consensus here is that by attending the US-based "Strategies" and the Taiwan-based Blue 2008 conference (BlueTaiwan.com) you'll have captured the business heart of the global solid state lighting, LED-lighting and LED industries. There are several good market, business, and technical conferences in the various LED producing countries and regions, including Korea, Japan, China and Europe, and any conference will draw primarily from the country where it is held, but Strategies and Blue do something different, making those two unique.

Strategies in Light
Now in its 9th year, Strategies is by far the largest LED conference, and successfully covers the breadth of the market. Established by Strategies Unlimited, which along with LEDs Magazine is part of PennWell publishing, the conference has kept pace with the growing market, both in its content and attendance. This year is projected to be another record-breaker, with up to 800 attendees and a still larger exhibition compared to last year. Strategies has grown so well and consistently primarily because it has made a quality agenda that matches the needs of today's market the priority. It's easy to throw out the buzz words and fill slots with "somebody", but there is truly an art to creating a neatly segmented, logically flowing 2-day conference that presents the most qualified speakers on the topics at hand. Strategies Unlimited's Dr. Robert Steele, a long time friend of our team, has been the guiding force in defining that agenda each year.

Bob is probably the most unassuming industry expert you will ever meet. He has a passion for the industry, and wants it to succeed for all the right reasons. Far from simply being a cheerleader, he brings an intimate knowledge of the overall LED marketplace and is willing to share what he knows, both in the form of his keynote talks, as well as any time you're fortunate enough to be able to engage him in a one-on-one conversation. His experience has been driven as a long-time analyst for the opto-electronic industry, which brought him to the compound semi materials, and subsequently into the application areas they serve. In the late 1990s, as the opto-communications technology was becoming ubiquitous, the LED technologies began to separate themselves as a market in their own right, with the timing of their potential for adoption in general purpose lighting starting to become evident to those that were participating. That opportunity wasn't lost on the team at Strategies Unlimited, and they began to add some additional focus into the LED arena. Interestingly, Jo Ann McDonald, our founding editor at CompoundSemi Online (which later added its Solid State Lighting Net/LIGHTimes arm), was enlisted for her conference and marketing expertise to help implement that new event, suggesting the name "Strategies in Light" in the process. Jo Ann and Bob's collaboration worked, and Strategies set off towards the success that you see today.

Perhaps the coolest thing about Strategies is that it has evolved in lock-step with the interests and opportunities of the industry as a whole. Always a west-coast US event, it is located almost exactly mid-way between Asia and Europe, much as the US LED-related market is. Asia has been the historic epi-center in chips, and strong in packaged LED lamps and the earliest mainstream applications, including keypads, handhelds, and display backlighting. Europe has been an hotbed of forward thinking lighting design, laid a lot of the groundwork for automotive applications and was the early champion of OLED technologies. In between are the US and Canada, where you find major chip, lamp and lighting companies, as well as a lot of the IP that makes up today's light engines and control systems. From an original focus on the materials and chips, Strategies has moved up the chain to a focus today on the breadth of applications and industry issues as a whole, with only a few talks on underlying componentry or technology. This is about "the markets" in which high brightness LEDs have and will find their homes.

Keynoters this year include Bas van de Kieft, Executive VP of Phillips lighting, who will share his thoughts on some scenarios regarding the penetration of the general lighting market by solid state lighting, and of course, Bob Steele who will be sharing the latest global market report and forecast. Featured speakers from luminaire manufacturers include Bob Smith, Director of Innovation and Advanced Engineering at Cooper Lighting (whose enthusiasm for SSL is extremely contagious) and Liam Kelly, who is managing director at Nualight. At the technology level, we'll be hearing from Bernhard Stapp, VP and GM of SSL at OSRAM Opto Semiconductors on the target markets and status of OLEDs. It's simple... don't miss Strategies.

Blue 2008

The next "can't miss" on the industry calendar is the Blue 2008 event, returning this year to the attractive Ambassador Hotel in Hsinchu, Taiwan, on May 7-8. Work is underway now to finalize the agenda and speakers, so expect to hear more of those details here in 1-2 weeks. Blue was launched back in 2003, as a celebration of the commercial emergence of the nitride-based blue-spectrum devices, including blue and white LEDs, as well as the blue laser diodes that were to become the heart of the "high def" DVD revolution. When blue and white were added to the existing red and green LEDs, it marked the effective beginning of the LED lighting revolution. In 2004, Blue moved to Taiwan, establishing itself as a leading industry event, with its main focus on the chip and packaged "lamp" level of the LED supply chain. In 2006 and 2007, there was an agenda emphasis on "understanding and meeting the needs of the lighting industry" with the intention to better connect the chip and packaged device producers with the rapidly emerging general lighting markets. For the 2008, it's time for Blue to bring the spotlight back onto the core level of LED innovation at the materials, chip and packaged lamp level. We're pleased to be able to bring Bob Steele and his mid-year global market update to the Asian audience. He'll be joined by Asif Anwar of Strategy Analytics, who will be covering the GaN and materials market developments, along with some related updates including a bit on blue lasers. New with us this year will be Enboa Wu of Hong Kong's research lab, ASTRI for updates on mainland China's programs and progress, and we'll be rejoined by the good folks at Taiwan's Photonic Industry Development Association (PIDA) who will provide local market insights that you don't find anywhere else. Make your plans now.

When it comes to conferences, its all about who you'll meet and what nuggets you will carry away that make a difference in your business. Who you'll meet is almost entirely dependent on the quality of the agenda, which, in turn, is driven by the organizer's market knowledge and their integration with the industry (we call it having "skin in the game"). We'll be there, and we look forward to seeing you as well at Strategies and at Blue.

Germany Embraces LED Lighting for Carbon Credits

LEDs Integrated in European Energy Efficiency Program

Major German Utility Company Promotes Energy-Efficient, CO2 Offset-Certified Lamina LEDs to Consumers and Businesses as Replacements for Traditional Lighting Products

Lamina Lighting Incorporated (Lamina), an innovator of LED lighting systems and technologies, today announced that the company’s LED lamps will be utilized in an energy efficiency initiative launched by RWE Rhein-Ruhr, the major regional energy company of the RWE Group. RWE ranks among Europe’s leading integrated electricity and gas companies and is one of the largest electricity producers in Germany.

The program represents an effort by RWE Rhein-Ruhr to help commercial and residential customers conserve energy and reduce utility bills by replacing their current light sources with Lamina’s SōL™ MR16 LED product, the only LED in the world which carries a CO2 offset certification.

“We are very proud that our SōL MR16 LED has been chosen to play a relevant part in the RWE energy efficiency program in Germany,” said Frank M. Shinneman, President and CEO of Lamina. “Working together with RWE Rhein-Ruhr and our partner-distributor Richard Schahl GmbH in Germany, we are happy to help more people become familiar with Lamina’s unique product innovations and efficiencies, and how their use can have a positive effect on the environment in the long run.”

RWE is based in Essen, Germany, and through its various regional energy companies and subsidiaries supplies 20 million electricity customers and 10 million gas customers throughout Europe. The LED initiative involves public announcements in the company’s 38 showrooms across Germany, and the distribution of almost 3 million newsletters. The newsletters explain to residential customers the positive aspects of using LED replacements; 56,000 industrial customers will also receive special brochures. Plans are underway for RWE Rhein-Ruhr to work in partnership with Richard Schahl GmbH, the European distributor of Lamina products, to train RWE-certified electricians on the correct and professional installation of the Lamina LED lamps into businesses such as hotels and retail shops, as well as inform them about potential costs and energy savings. All major electrical wholesalers will carry stock for Lamina’s SōL MR16 throughout Germany.

Lamina’s SōL MR16 LED product uses less than 8 watts of energy and produces the same amount of light, for a much longer period of time, than a 20 watt halogen light bulb. Lamina labels its SōL product with a “green tag” which highlights the bulb’s energy consumption as compared to its equivalent in the form of carbon credits offset. For the SōL this amounts to approximately ½ of a carbon credit (a carbon credit is equal to the emission of one metric ton of carbon dioxide). SōL’s CO2 offset was certified by an independent third party: The Carbon Credit Company LLC – the U.S. subsidiary of Frankfurt-based 3C Group. Among other services, 3C helps companies like Lamina – and their customers – achieve “climate neutrality” with their products and operations. The concept of carbon neutrality dictates that organizations and/or individuals make a commitment to the option of compensating for unavoidable emissions by reducing or avoiding emissions elsewhere.

Certification of the SōL is just one aspect of Lamina’s Carbon Footprint Reduction Program™, a comprehensive, company-wide environmental initiative. Along with a growing list of partners, Lamina supports a web site, truthinlighting.org that provides a wealth of information about how companies and individuals can work toward achieving carbon neutrality. Interactive forums, blogs, and RSS feeds will establish the site as a source for concrete factual information in regard to lighting and energy consumption.

Lamina is also undertaking a plan that includes a carbon footprint reduction of its own with a goal of corporate carbon neutrality, also to be facilitated by 3C Group.

iDrive™ 1000 Powers LED Grow Lights

As promised in the LED Grow Lights 1000+ Lumen LED post, here is one of many Bench Power Supplies posts for working with the latest generation UHB LEDs. This is one of the best Solid State Lighting PSUs on the market, and should be on every DIY LED Grow Light bench.
( Radiant Research- please send over an engineering sample for test and review purposes, I will pay for shipping and duty! )

Integrated System Technologies, a leading European LED driver design manufacturer, has released the new 210 Watt 3 channel iDrive™ 1000 LED driver. The driver is a natural extension to the current iDrive™ range which includes the 3 channel 350mA driver, the iDrive™ Lite. Both products incorporate patented Pulse Amplitude Modulation (PAM) drive technology and ColourCool™, a thermal management system to ensure optimum LED output and life.

The new iDrive™ 1000 delivers an industry leading level of energy efficiency provided through new patent pending technology which delivers twice the power density of the iDrive™ Lite. The breakthrough in combining high power density with leading PSU efficiency ensures the iDrive™ 1000 has a small footprint and does not require large heatsinks.

A new feature enables iDrive™ 1000 users to choose the forward current, independently on all three channels between 500mA-1000mA. This exclusive feature introduced to the high power LED market place enables users to select the forward current digitally by channel for optimum LED performance. Each channel’s forward current can be precisely varied in 50mA steps via the LED display panel. Unlike most solutions in the market, there are no external DMX address switches making it very quick to install and configure. The 1000 provides an increased forward voltage range up to 55V per channel to allow for the increase in forward voltage in high power LEDs when driving these products at higher currents. Additional features include a master/slave option, increased internal preset programmes and user selectable thermister settings for desired fixture lumen maintenance in any environment.

The iDrive™ range uses patented technologies that differentiates it from all LED drivers on the market, in addition the drivers will only supply the correct forward voltage required by each LED channel and compensates for voltage drop over long cable runs thereby optimising the energy required to drive the LED fixture. This makes the iDrive™ solutions the most intelligent and power efficient drivers on the market, providing a significant advantage to all SSL manufacturers that are serious about reducing the carbon footprint of their lighting product range.

Sales Director Matt Fitzpatrick said, “Since we launched the iDrive™ Lite in March 07, it has been received fantastically by the market place however, the design team are extremely excited about the potential of the iDrive™ 1000. There is choice globally for drivers in the 350mA 3 channel class but there are no 210 Watt high efficiency drivers that allow the user to vary the current on each channel between 500mA-1000mA. With many of the high power LED manufacturers now delivering product that is optimised at 700mA and 1000mA drive currents, we now feel that the iDrive™ 1000 will give the SSL manufacturers a high quality power supply solution and allow them to efficiently get more lumens for their money”.

The iDrive™ 1000 will be available in volume from September 2007 with engineering sample available in August
Dimensions 200mm x 150mm x 70mm
Weight 0.8Kg approx.
Compatible with all high power LEDs

About Integrated System Technologies Limited
IST Ltd is a professional lighting group company specialising in the development of innovative lighting solutions for the general, wide area, architectural and entertainment lighting industry. It offers over 20 years of experience in traditional and solid state lighting including award winning electronic and optical system design for a variety of lighting products from controllers to luminaires.

Radiant Research Ltd is the solid state lighting division of IST which designs and manufactures advanced solid state lighting products from LED light engines through to driver solutions. All LED driver technology designed and produced by Radiant Research incorporates our unique patented technology Colour Cool™ (GRANTED in UK & USA) to ensure optimum LED efficiency of multiple channel systems. This unique and patented driving technology uses Pulse Amplitude Modulation (PAM). This technique provides optimum colour mixing (RGB/A/W) and full additive luminosity which, integrated into our closed loop temperature monitory system, ensures optimum LED output regardless of environmental conditions.

Goldeneye Allowed LED Lighting Color Conversion Patent

Goldeneye, Inc., creator of light recycling technology and the world’s brightest LED light sources, today announced the allowance by the U.S. Patent Office for its patent of a new color conversion method for LEDs utilizing a solid luminescent element. This “wavelength conversion chip” can be used with Goldeneye’s recycling light cavity or attached directly to any LED. The patent covers both methods of manufacture and a wide range of applications in solid-state lighting. The technology described in the patent enables Goldeneye’s next generation of LED light products to produce white, yellow, green, red and a spectrum of visible colors from blue or ultraviolet LEDs.

"This technology will enable significant improvements in efficiency and color rendering as well as greatly simplifying binning requirements”, says Scott Zimmerman, Vice President of Technology for Goldeneye. “It also delivers life and thermal performance that powdered phosphor approaches simply cannot match.”

This patent will add to Goldeneye's already strong IP portfolio, enhancing the company’s ability to manufacture and license technology in virtually all solid-state lighting applications. It encompasses ceramic processing techniques such as tape casting and sintering to form thin luminescent sheets for volume production.

In Goldeneye’s basic technology, multiple LEDs are combined in a “light-recycling cavity” to enhance their individual brightness output. By incorporating the conversion chip in this arrangement, the individual LEDs can operate at lower drive levels with improved optical efficiency, unlike other high brightness approaches that rely on overdrive conditions. The result is a light source with a longer lifetime, greater wavelength stability and superb color uniformity.

“Our early work in the area of very high intensity LED sources forced us several years ago to develop a new type of wavelength conversion technology compatible with these high flux levels”, says Zimmerman. “The conversion chip will enable all of Goldeneye’s high brightness LED light products to operate at greater efficiency than in other conversion schemes”.

About Goldeneye

Goldeneye, Inc. is a technology foundry and light product manufacturer focused on optical solutions to the solid-state lighting market. The company is headquartered in Carlsbad, California.

Cree Prototypes 1,000+ Lumen LED chip

Cree breaks 1000 Lumens on a single die!

The next post should be about LED Grow Light bench power supplies that can handle the additional power requirements of the emerging next generation solid state lighting chips.

With a driving current of 4A, the company's prototype, single-die LED delivers a light output of 1,050 lumens in cool white, a level comparable to a standard incandescent bulb, and 760 lumens in a warm-white version.

As a result, the company claims this breakthrough may lead to the development of LEDs that will make traditional light bulbs obsolete.

Efficacy of the cool-white LED is 72 lumens/Watt and, for the warm-white device, 52 lumens/Watt.

Both versions allegedly operate at significantly higher efficacy levels than conventional light bulbs.

Solid State FUV LEDs reach 210nm

These new Far-Ultraviolet (FUV) leds are great news for the many in the Bio Industries:

A joint research group led by Japan's Institute of Physical and Chemical Research (Riken) and Saitama University developed a UV-LED with an emission wavelength as short as 227.5 nm and an output of 0.15 mW.

Thus far, another research group has reported the development of a UV-LED with an emission wavelength of 210 nm, but its output was only 0.02 μW. In addition to the prototype unveiled this time, the research group of Riken and Saitama University succeeded in prototyping UV-LEDs with a wavelength of 253 nm and an output of 1 mW, 261 nm and 1.65 mW, and 273 nm and 3.3 mW.

According to the group, the outputs of these UV-LEDs are substantially equivalent to those of blue, red and white LEDs used in electric lamps. And the outputs are on a level such that these UV-LEDs can be used as-is in germicidal lamps.

With a view to applications for sterilization, water purification, medical care and the high-speed degradative treatment of pollutants, etc., the research group intends to further enhance the efficiency and output of its latest UV-LED.

The prototype UV-LED uses an AlGaN semiconductor. The UV-LED was obtained by first forming an ALN layer on a sapphire substrate, and then forming an n-type AlGaN layer, AlGaN emitting layer (triple quantum well structure), p-type AlGaN layer, etc. stacked on one another by crystal growth.

The research group upgraded the crystal growth method of the AlN layer provided on the sapphire substrate to enhance the output. According to the new method, multiple AlN layers are formed by alternately using two different growth methods.

First, an AlN layer is formed by continuously supplying the Al material while intermittently supplying (i.e. supplying in a pulsed manner) ammonium gas. Then, another AlN layer is formed by continuously supplying both the Al material and ammonium gas.

This crystal growth method is called the Ammonia pulsed supply multiple layer growth method. The method resulted in (1) a decrease of threading dislocation density in the AlN crystals, (2) an increase in flatness of crystal layers and (3) a reduction of cracks due to the distortion in the crystals.

Because the quality and flatness of the AlN layer was improved, other layers formed on the AlN layers also resulted in higher quality and flatness, thereby enhancing the emission intensity (output) from the AlGaN emitting layer. The emission intensity was increased to approximately 50 times that obtained by the existing AlN layer formation method.

The latest UV-LED was an achievement by Hideki Hirayama, the head of Terahertz Quantum Device Laboratory, Terahertz-wave Research Program, Frontier Research System of Riken, and Norihiko Kamata, professor of graduate school of science and engineering, Saitama University.

New InGaN substrates yield safer UHB-LEDs

InGaN substrates will bring brighter Led Grow Lights and offer a safer future as the world goes PoHS (Prohibition on Certain Hazardous Substances)

TDI announces the release of new InGaN substrates for light emitting devices

August 16, 2007... Silver Spring, Maryland, USA Technologies and Devices International, Inc. (TDI), the leading developer and supplier of compound nitride semiconductor materials, today announces availability of the world’s first InGaN substrate materials. InGaN is the key compound semiconductor material used for the fabrication of GaN-based ultra violet (UV), blue, green, and white light emitting diodes (LEDs) and blue laser diodes (LDs). InGaN materials serve as the light emitting regions of these light-emitting devices and determine device parameters including efficiency, light output power and lifetime. InGaN substrates are needed to provide material match for InGaN-based device epitaxial structures and to boost device performance.

“Our success with the InGaN epitaxial process exemplifies our business strategy to bring the most advanced substrate materials to the LED and solid-state lighting market at the fastest possible pace,” said Vladimir Dmitriev, President and CEO of TDI. “Since the first demonstration of high quality InGaN materials grown by hydride vapor phase epitaxy (HVPE) in 2006, we have been receiving continuous requests from our customers regarding these new products. Today we are pleased to announce the expansion of our substrate materials offering to include InGaN substrates. Support provided by the US Department of Energy and Department of Defense for this product development is greatly appreciated. We view this effort as one of the key components to enable advanced light emitting devices, particularly for solid state lighting applications.”

“No other existing substrates provide such an excellent material match between the substrate and the InGaN-based light emitting epitaxial structure,” added Alexander Syrkin, a senior crystal growth specialist for the company. “Composition of the InGaN can be carefully controlled to produce substrate materials matching customer device structure requests. Crystal lattice and thermal match between the substrate and the overgrown InGaN device has been predicted for a long time to reduce defects in the light emitting regions, increase light emitting efficiency and device lifetime. With these substrates, this is now possible”.

The product

New substrates consist of an InGaN layer deposited on 2-inch GaN/sapphire template. InN content in the InGaN layers ranges from 5 to 20 mol. %. Targeted applications are high brightness UV, blue, and green light emitting devices including light emitting diodes and, potentially, blue and green laser diodes. Currently InGaN template substrates are available in limited quantities. Volume production of InGaN template substrates is scheduled to begin in early 2008. For more information please visit www.tdii.com.

The Process and Fabrication Platforms

InGaN substrates are fabricated using proprietary patented HVPE process. The technology and equipment developed at TDI are the world’s first industrial scale HVPE platforms capable of producing state of the art AlN, GaN, AlGaN, InN, and InGaN epitaxial products with a wide range of deposition rates, various doping levels, wide composition ranges, and low defect densities. Epitaxial materials are manufactured using multi-wafer high throughput patented HVPE equipment developed and built at TDI. The process and equipment is scalable up to 6-inch and larger wafers. All production is run at TDI’s facility in Silver Spring, MD, USA.

Product featuring

TDI will report properties of InGaN substrates at the 4th China International Forum & Exhibition on Solid State Lighting, Shanghai, August 22-24, 2007, and the 1st International Conference on White LEDs and Solid State Lighting, Tokyo, November 26-30, 2007. New InGaN products will be displayed at the 7th International Conference on Nitride Semiconductors, Las Vegas, September 16-21, 2007.

About TDI

The company is a privately owned developer and manufacturer of novel compound semiconductors including GaN, AlN, AlGaN, InN, and InGaN. TDI has developed and commercialized a variety of compound semiconductor materials, primarily for applications in solid state lighting, short wavelength optoelectronics and RF power electronics. For novel development results and TDI’s product list please visit www.tdii.com

Cree Offers Breakthrough 100-Lumen XLamp LEDs

Things are starting to heat up in Solid State Lighting again!

Cree, Inc. (Nasdaq:CREE), a market leader in LED solid-state lighting components, today announced commercial availability of XLamp(r) LEDs with minimum luminous flux of 100 lumens at 350 mA. XLamp LEDs are the first LEDs to be available in volume with this level of performance. This advance sets a new standard in lighting-class LED brightness and efficiency.

XLamp LEDs have now achieved a 100% improvement in performance over the past 17 months. They can deliver either 25% greater brightness with improved efficacy, or they can deliver up to 55% greater brightness at the same efficacy when compared to the previous generation of XLamp LEDs. Moreover, the new XLamp LEDs retain the same footprint as previous XLamp LEDs, thereby protecting customers' design investments.

"Cree is to be congratulated on surpassing the 100-lumen level in its commercial white LED products," said Robert Steele, director of the optoelectronics practice at market research firm Strategies Unlimited. "The availability of such high-performance devices should certainly accelerate the conversion of the lighting market to solid-state sources."

"This is an announcement of volume availability, not an R&D result or availability of a few parts," stated Norbert Hiller, Cree vice president and general manager for lighting LEDs. "These LEDs can enable lighting manufactures to create fixtures using fewer LEDs than before, thereby lowering initial product cost and reducing energy consumption."

LED and Solid State Lighting manufacturers sought for economic feasibility demonstration

Great news for all DIY LED Grow Light builders, this is your chance to submit your LED product idea for demonstration and testing by your peers! Better hurry, your LED Lighting proposal must be received by close of business on April 16, 2007, electronic or hard copy submissions accepted.

To: Potential Manufacturing Participants in the Solid State Lighting Technology Demonstrations

On behalf of the U.S. Department of Energy, the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) invites your participation in an upcoming demonstration of solid state lighting (or light emitting diode, LED) technology for general illumination applications. White LEDs have continued their rapid technological advance, as reflected by a number of recent new product announcements. This project, which will include several demonstration sites and products, is intended to place newly commercial state of the art products into real world applications that will clearly demonstrate their performance and cost-effectiveness.

The planned approach seeks to establish several participant teams that will typically consist of a product manufacturer (or group of manufacturers, such as a collaboration between a chip maker and a fixture manufacturer), an energy efficiency organization/utility, a host site, and PNNL. The number of individual teams and demonstration projects will depend upon the suitability and attractiveness of proposals received, but we expect between two and five individual projects in the first round of demonstrations.

PNNL has already initiated a separate effort to identify other non-manufacturer team members; a partial listing of organizations expressing strong interest in participating is included as Attachment A to this letter. Note that potential host sites are intended to include both public and private sector organizations; we are currently working with the energy efficiency organizations listed to help identify private sector sites.

More details on participating in this opportunity can be found in the “Invitation to Participate” included as Attachment B. We are striving to streamline the overall process and minimize the submission burden on potential team members. Requested information is therefore brief and focuses on details that will allow evaluators to judge the credibility of proposals received. While there is no page length limit, we anticipate the requested information can be adequately addressed in ten pages or less. We expect this technology demonstration activity to span multiple years rather than being a one-time effort; future rounds of demonstrations are planned as federal funds are made available. In order to be considered for this first round, all manufacturer proposals to participate must be received no later than close of business on April 16, 2007. Proposals received after that date will not be considered.

Please direct all submitted materials or questions to me using the contact information provided below. Either electronic or hard copy submissions are acceptable.

Regards,

Bruce Kinzey
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
620 SW 5th Ave, Suite 810
Portland, OR 97212
T (503) 417-7564
F (503) 417-2175
Bruce.Kinzey@pnl.gov

Attachment A: Team Members Expressing Strong Participation Interest to Date
Utilities/Energy Efficiency Organizations
Southern California Edison
Pacific Gas and Electric
Sacramento Municipal Utility District
Northwest Energy Efficiency Alliance
Host Site Agencies*
Army
Navy
Air Force
Commerce
Environmental Protection Agency
Smithsonian Institute
Federal Aviation Administration
Treasury/Bureau of Engraving and Printing
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration/National Weather Service
United States Postal Service
U.S. Forest Service

*All are Federal at present; private sector host sites (e.g., builders) will be identified by working through existing relationships of either utilities/energy efficiency organization team members or manufacturing participants.

Attachment B:

DOE Solid State Lighting Technology Demonstration Invitation for Lighting Equipment Manufacturer Participation March 15, 2007

I. PREFACE

The enclosed package describes a series of team agreements that the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) wishes to enter on behalf of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), for the purpose of demonstrating advanced LED-based lighting systems for general illumination (see Section II Overview for a more detailed description of specific project activities). Rather than establishing procurement contracts among the parties involved, these teams are to take the form of working collaborations where each team member bears its own costs. Team members envisioned within each collaboration include DOE/PNNL, manufacturers of solid state lighting (SSL) products, energy efficiency organizations (or utilities), and owners of demonstration host sites. This particular package addresses the participation of manufacturing team members.

As the organization leading the activity, DOE/PNNL intends to identify products suitable for demonstration, assist in identifying and evaluating suitable host sites, provide organization of the overall activity, evaluate the results (both quantitative and qualitative), conduct product performance and life testing, and support subsequent project information dissemination. DOE intends for each of the other team members in a particular collaboration to make an essential contribution, subject to negotiation, as follows:

• Lighting Manufacturers (including teams of chip and fixture manufacturers) – donate products to be demonstrated, and at their option participate further in identification/selection of host sites and assisting in installation design;

• Energy Efficiency Organizations (or Utilities) – provide contacts with potential host site organizations, and assurances and support to host sites as needed to ensure that demonstrations proceed smoothly; provide crucial follow up promotional activities post-demonstration;

• Host site organizations – offer locations for product demonstration along with a willingness to participate in demonstration-related activities.

• To be determined – responsibility for any lighting design and installation services will be negotiated on a project specific basis.

The number of teams to be formed will be guided by the combination of suitable products available and host sites in which to demonstrate them, combined with available resources. Team members are not restricted to a single team; a large hosting organization might demonstrate products from more than one manufacturer or a single manufacturer might donate multiple products designed for different applications.

A key component of the intended agreement is that no procurement exists between PNNL and any of the team members. Each team member agrees to act in good faith towards the mutually desired end goal, but the universally advantageous outcome of achieving the goal is the primary motivation behind the team rather than the sale of its products or services. At the time each team is formed, roles will be clarified and documented in a Teaming Agreement.

PNNL is choosing this approach to minimize time required for project initiation. The other involved parties may enter into demonstration projects exclusive of PNNL as desired, however PNNL requests to be informed of any such agreement if established.

II. TECHNOLOGY DEMONSTRATION PROGRAM OVERVIEW

Introduction:

The U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) at Richland, Washington, is interested in receiving proposals for LED-based lighting systems specifically designed for residential and commercial general illumination applications. The Pacific Northwest Division of Battelle Memorial Institute (Battelle) operates PNNL for DOE under Prime Contract DE-AC05-76RL01830 and is the legal entity issuing this Invitation for Participation (IFP). Lighting products will not be purchased by PNNL under any resulting agreement. The purpose of this Technology Demonstration is to facilitate the market introduction of LED-based products for general illumination which meet the intent of the technical guidelines described in Section III.

Program Overview:

A number of solid state lighting (or light-emitting diode, LED) products intended for general illumination applications appear poised for near-term commercialization that will offer significant improvements over conventional lighting technologies. The DOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy is interested in facilitating commercialization of such LED technologies and promoting the energy and environmental benefits they promise.

DOE has asked PNNL to assemble and lead a Technology Demonstration project for this purpose. The intent of this project is to identify a limited number of advanced LED products either recently introduced or on the verge of commercialization that are available for installation and testing in various applications, and to find team member host sites where these products can be installed and their attributes clearly demonstrated. The results of demonstrations that are deemed a success will be widely publicized. Final project evaluation reports, to be written by PNNL, will be made publicly available soon after project completion. DOE is interested in working with team members and/or host site organizations with the interest and capability to follow up successful projects with either large scale purchases or promotion of featured products. In order to avoid actual or apparent conflicts of interest, project participants will not be permitted to use any such reports to assert or imply the endorsement by DOE, PNNL, Battelle or the host site organization of their lighting products.

The project is intended to identify and assist in the early adoption of high performance products that are (or very soon will be) commercially available and that offer users real value through significant, rather than merely incremental, improvements over the current best competing products. Products chosen for demonstration will be selected based on their potential to demonstrate the advanced state of the art in LED technology, while being economically sound investments for the building owner/investor.

An important factor in determining the suitability of products for field demonstration is their expected commercial availability date. Manufacturers must stipulate that products intended for a field demonstration site will be commercially available within three months of the start of the project. Products not meeting this requirement will not be put into a field demonstration site, although they might be selected for individual demonstration with other prototypes, or put into a queue for site demonstration at a later date.

The overall project has six phases, some of which run concurrently:

1) Products to be demonstrated will be screened based on the contents of the submitted proposals;

2) Laboratory testing (both short- and longer-term) of samples of each product passing the screening will ensue to establish or verify important attributes of performance;

3) Host sites and team members will be identified to carry out the actual demonstration of products satisfying the selection criteria;

4) The products will be installed and the demonstrations carried out;

5) PNNL will conduct evaluations of the results, including energy and cost savings and related economic analyses, and compiling qualitative responses of host sites to the LED light source; and

6) Results of successful demonstrations will be widely publicized subject to the above restriction on endorsement. While no sales of demonstrated products is assured, it is expected that large-scale product purchases or promotions by demonstration team members will also occur at this stage for products that have sufficiently performed to buyers’ satisfaction.

DOE is interested in products that will be economically justifiable and that can eventually impact a large segment of the lighting market. Residential downlighting is one preferred application due to its prevalence in US homes and because the directional nature of LED illumination matches well with the needs of this application. Where a significant market exists, however, other proposed applications will be considered and every effort will be made to locate potential host sites in those application areas.

In cases where host site(s) are not identified for the intended application, manufacturers will be given an option to either select one of the other host sites identified by DOE/PNNL, or to withdraw their proposal from consideration. Manufacturing participants will also be encouraged to supply or participate in the actual installation design once host sites have been selected to ensure that their products are demonstrated in a manner taking full advantage of their attributes.

Finally, because LED technology for general illumination is relatively new, some specific products and application designs may not have existed prior to this demonstration. Issues such as future manufacturing capability and retail pricing may thus involve projections rather than actual market data. This situation underlies some of the information requirements in the proposal template in Section IV.

III. SELECTION CRITERIA

The stated goal of this activity is to identify state of the art LED products intended for general illumination that are or soon will be commercially available, and demonstrate them in applications where they are both cost effective and preferred by end-users over competing conventional technologies. The project will follow up with significant education and encouragement aimed to spur large scale sales of products successfully meeting the above criteria.

Because the range of attributes (e.g., levels of performance) that may offer value varies widely across potential applications, maximum flexibility is necessary in their specification. A further complication arises from the fact that altering one attribute in a given product often directly impacts another.

In general, DOE is interested in products that perform at least as well as those that would qualify for DOE’s draft Energy Star criteria, which can be found at http://energystar.gov/index.cfm?c=new_specs.ssl_luminaires .

The overarching priorities for selecting products for this demonstration project are performance, commercial availability, and economic value. In screening submitted product proposals, each of these factors is to be weighted equally when DOE evaluates their suitability for demonstration. That is, the performance of the product (both in energy and economic terms), its anticipated cost and commercial availability will each comprise a third of the evaluation for whether to pursue a given proposal. The subtopics within each of those priority categories are given below.

Performance evaluation factors (1/3)
Luminaire Efficacy
Color temperature (and chromaticity coordinates)
CRI
Light distribution pattern suitable for intended application
Luminaire suitable for intended application (e.g., method of thermal management)
Economic evaluation factors (1/3)
Fixture cost
Electricity usage
Expected life
Technology replaced
Warranty
Commercial availability evaluation factors (1/3)
Anticipated date of first product availability
Evidence supporting the availability of volume* manufacturing capacity
Intended market outlets

*volume estimates to be provided by proposers

In addition to the factors above, additional product features may offer increased attraction to potential buyers that enhance their marketability in particular applications. For example, such a feature would include dimming capability of the product in residential interior environments. Proposers will be provided an opportunity to note such additional features and will, in effect, be given “extra credit” for their perceived value.

Finally, particular applications may impose certain mandatory requirements on products that are not necessarily universal across all applications. An example here would be requirements placed on products (e.g., UL certification, applicable building codes) to be demonstrated in a production housing environment. All such requirements must be met by the product before it will be considered for demonstration in those applications.

IV. PROPOSAL TEMPLATE

The elements requested in each proposal have been kept to a minimum in order to ease
and expedite the submission process. In all cases, the information sought is just that necessary to identify noteworthy products and the appropriate applications for each. Additional product literature or future market impact forecasts are neither requested nor desired. A convincing, but concise argument is preferred over a detailed market analysis.

Each submitted proposal must include:

A. Application - the specific application(s) for which the product is intended, including the conventional technology(ies) that the product will replace. Include photos or graphics of both the luminaire and its installed appearance in the target application. Please also indicate whether you have a potential host site already identified.

B. Specifications Sheet - a completed specifications sheet (included in Section V) for the product and any supporting test data.

C. Economic Case - a concise economic argument for the product in its intended application. Include any assumptions necessary, such as hours/day of lighting system use and price of electricity.

D. Supplemental Technical Description (optional) – clarification of any apparent installation or other technical issues, such as means of adequate heat rejection, where they are not evident from the above information. Note that proposal evaluators are not looking to uncover proprietary design secrets but, rather, assurances that the product will reliably work in the application. This is also the section in which additional features of the product, e.g., dimming capability, can be noted.

E. Product Cost Projections - a description of the anticipated product cost at retail and/or wholesale at various quantities.

F. Production Capability - evidence to support plans for commercial availability, including a timeline for when commercial production is expected and the various market outlets through which the product is expected to be available.

Items E and F essentially comprise a summary business plan for each product that provides enough detail to judge the credibility of proposals received. These items are important to the desired follow up activity of promoting large scale purchases of successful products. It is neither the intent of this project to demonstrate products that no one will ultimately buy because they are too expensive, nor to provoke disappointment by demonstrating products that must be significantly back-ordered due to insufficient production capacity.

That said, precise values are less important than a sound strategy for pursuing them. All that the proposal evaluators will be looking for is an assurance that a credible plan exists to make the products available in sufficient quantities at a cost-effective price.

V. PRODUCT SPECIFICATION SHEET

For purposes of this demonstration project, the values of interest are primarily those of the finished luminaire rather than the component LED sources. If the luminaire has not been photometrically tested and only chip-level data are available, then a uniform average loss factor of 0.35 will be applied to the chip-level data(1) for purposes of estimating luminaire performance in the first phase screening. In any case, the source of data used must be provided for all reported values.

Value Data Source
Product Name/Identifier
Total Measured Light Output
(lumens)
Beam Angle
Measured Energy Use in “On” Mode
(Watts)
Confirmation That Energy Use in
Standby Mode is Zero (Yes/No)
Calculated Luminaire Efficacy
(lumens/Watt)
Typical Measured Operating Current
(mA)
LED Manufacturer’s Recommended
Maximum
Operating Current (mA)
LED Chip Used
(Manufacturer/Model)
Chromaticity Coordinates
X (or u’)
Y (or v’)
Correlated Color Temperature
(K)
Color Rendering Index
Power Factor

1 Average of luminaires tested to date by the Commercial Product Testing Program. So for example, a luminaire using a chip rated at 100 lumens/watt only achieves an average 35 lumens/watt out of the fixture when all thermal effects, power supply, and driver losses are taken into account.

VI. TIMELINE

All times consecutive. Dates shown are maximum allowable; demonstrations will proceed more quickly if possible.

Due Date for Responding to Solicitation: April 16, 2007
Initial Selection of Products for Demonstration Completed: May 1, 2007
Initial Product Samples Due to PNNL: June 1, 2007
Product Short Term Testing Completed by PNNL: July 2, 2007
Installations Initiated: August 1, 2007
Demonstration Evaluations Completed: February 1, 2008

New Blue 'EZBright 700' LEDs from Cree

New EZBright(TM) 700 LED Power Chip Broadens Cree's High-Performance Chip Platform

Helping push the Solid State LED Grow Lighting industry forward, Cree, a leader in LED solid-state lighting components, today announced the release of its newest blue EZBright LED power chip. The EZBright 700 LED is the latest blue chip product based on Cree's flagship proprietary EZBright LED platform, which continues to set performance standards across a broad range of the LED marketplace. The EZBright 700 is the brightest, most cost-effective LED chip of its size with dominant wavelength bins covering ranges from 450nm to 470nm.

The EZBright 700 achieves a typical output of 260 mW at 350 mA and 440 mW at 700 mA. It is targeted for general lighting applications, including auto headlamps, streetlights, camera flash, projection lighting, personal lighting and indoor and outdoor display applications. The EZBright platform features a proprietary optical design that delivers an optimal Lambertian radiation pattern with reduced emission losses and high efficiency compared to Cree's other LED chip platforms. This high-efficiency design scales well with the size of the chip, a significant achievement for the industry.

"Cree recognizes the market need for high performance at low cost across a range of lighting applications," stated David Davito, Cree director of marketing for optoelectronics. "With the mid-size format EZBright 700, we're expanding the EZBright line to address a broader range of lighting markets."

About Cree, Inc.

Cree is a market-leading innovator and manufacturer of semiconductors and devices that enhance the value of solid-state lighting, power and communications products by significantly increasing their energy performance and efficiency. Key to Cree's market advantage is its world-class materials expertise in silicon carbide (SiC) and gallium nitride (GaN) for chips and packaged devices that can handle more power in a smaller space while producing less heat than other available technologies, materials and products.

Cree drives its increased performance technology into multiple applications, including exciting alternatives in brighter and more-tunable light for general illumination, backlighting for more-vivid displays, optimized power management for high-current, switch-mode power supplies and variable-speed motors, and more-effective wireless infrastructure for data and voice communications. Cree customers range from innovative lighting-fixture makers to defense-related federal agencies.

Cree's product families include blue and green LED chips, lighting LEDs, LED backlighting solutions, power-switching devices and radio- frequency/wireless devices.

Lumileds unlock Solid State LED Lighting Efficacy

Philips Lumileds of San Jose, CA, USA claims that it has fundamentally solved the problem of ‘droop’, a phenomenon common to white power LEDs in which efficacy (lumens per watt) decreases as current increases. The breakthrough enables efficacy to continue to increase even as drive current increases. The new technology will be implemented in 2007 in the firm’s LUXEON LEDs, which already deliver light output at drive currents of 1000mA and higher. Sampling of products is expected to begin in the next 90 days, with full production in Q3/2007.

More light and higher efficacy for white LEDs are essential to opening new lighting markets and to expand the reach of LED lighting into residential lighting segments, says Philips Lumileds. Incorporating the new epitaxial technology will allow the firm to deliver what it claims will be the industry’s first high-power LEDs that deliver 70 or more lumens per watt at drive currents of 1000mA and higher.

“While 350mA devices continue to improve in light output, they cannot deliver the light output of devices operated at 1A, 2A or even higher,” says Frank Steranka, executive VP research & development. “Most LED manufacturers have acknowledged the need to move beyond the 350mA space and have recently announced devices that can operate at currents up to 1000mA. The LUXEON K2 already supports a maximum current of 1.5A, and with our focus on power LEDs we will continue to expand that operating range,” he adds.

Philips Lumileds says that, as part of its expansion efforts, including its new wafer fab in Singapore, it is adding the necessary equipment and technology to its production lines so that the new technology can be implemented quickly.