Showing posts with label solid state lighting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label solid state lighting. Show all posts

Designing LED Grow Lights with a microcontroller

A recent article from Embedded.com may help walk DIY LED Grow Light builders through a simple application and design process when using a Microcontroller as a Switch-Mode Power Supply (SMPS). Though not quite as easy as some other LED Grow Light build ups on the internet, this design can be useful for both boost operation or buck-boost operation depending on the LED Grow Light application and LED voltages required.

Light-emitting diodes (LEDs) have emerged in recent years as viable sources of light and are no longer used solely as status-light indicators for electronic equipment. Advances in technology have provided LEDs that are typically three times more efficient than incandescent bulbs. LEDs are also extremely durable and have lifetimes exceeding tens of thousands of hours. Power LEDs for lighting applications are designed to be driven with a constant current source. It is common to see standard current drive levels of 350mA and 700mA among different LED manufacturers.

The forward voltage across the LED can, however, vary depending on the type and number of junctions connected in series. Many manufacturers of power LEDs will provide multiple junctions, integrated into a single module.

One simple method that can be used to drive an LED is to install a resistor, in series, to limit the current. A linear voltage regulator or operational-amplifier (op-amp) circuit can also be connected in a constant-current configuration. However, these linear methods will not have enough efficiency at the required power levels.

A Switch-Mode Power Supply (SMPS) provides a much more efficient solution for driving the LED. An SMPS can buck or boost the input voltage to the correct level, to provide the desired LED current. The system input-voltage range and the required LED forward voltage will determine the SMPS topology that is selected. Buck-boost converter
The buck-boost converter topology is used when the supply voltage may be above or below the required output voltage and is especially useful for battery applications. This topology is also known as a fly-back or inverting regulator. A buck-boost converter can be implemented as shown in Figure 1 above.

This implementation has the advantage that a simple, low-side MOSFET driver circuit can be used. The topology shown in Figure 1 will generate a positive voltage, referenced to the input-voltage rail. The downside of this buck- boost implementation is that the load is not referenced to the circuit ground.

A simplified circuit design for an LED driver is shown in Figure 2 below, using a mixed signal, high voltage 8bit microcontroller, such as Microchip Technology's PIC16HV785. The output of the circuit is referenced to the battery voltage, not to ground. The output of the inverter is connected to the LED anode and produces a voltage that is greater than the input voltage.
The PIC16HV785 mixed signal microcontroller combines an 8bit microcontroller core with several on-chip analogue peripherals. These include a high speed, two-phase PWM circuit, ideal for current-mode control of switch-mode power supplies, and two on-chip op-amps that can be used to amplify the voltage across the current-sensing resistors.

This allows the use of very small sensing resistors, which reduces circuit losses and increases overall efficiency. The on-chip high voltage shunt regulator eliminates the need for an external 5V regulator when operating from higher supply voltages.

The PIC16HV785 also integrates a digital Capture, Compare and PWM (CCP) module, two analogue comparators, a 10bit A/D converter, an 8MHz internal clock circuit, internal precision voltage reference, and a programmable Brown-Out Reset (BOR) circuit. All of the pins of the op amps and comparators are externally accessible, so that any circuit configuration can be implemented.

The current-sensing op amp is connected as a differential amplifier, to obtain an accurate measurement of the voltage across the current- sense resistor. The current is measured in the return of the power source, to simplify the requirements of the circuit. R1, R2 and C1 form a low-pass filter to reduce any switching noise that may be present. The cut-off frequency of this filter must be chosen above the converter switching frequency, to avoid limiting the control loop response.

Analogue Style Module
The two-phase PWM module, an internal comparator and a voltage reference form the circuit that regulates the amount of LED current. The two-phase PWM is an analogue-style module that works on the set/reset principle.

First, a clock signal, derived from the system clock, is used to periodically turn on the PWM output. The PWM clock signal sets the fundamental PWM frequency. Then, a reset signal from one of the on-chip comparators turns off the PWM output, when a specified reference level has been reached.

The amplified current signal is internally routed to the positive input of Comparator 1 on the PIC16HV785. The Capture-Compare Peripheral (CCP1) on the PIC16HV785 is used in the PWM mode to generate the voltage reference for the comparator. Using the PWM allows fine control of the comparator reference voltage. The PWM signal is filtered with an RC filter to produce an analogue voltage and is connected to the negative comparator input pin.

The software for this application is very simple, since the LED current-control function is accomplished in the analogue domain. After all peripherals have been enabled and a current-reference level has been set, the LED will continue to illuminate without software intervention.

However, the application code can use the on-chip 10bit A/D converter to measure the supply voltage, which then drives the LED in a constant-power mode. As the battery input voltage changes, a new voltage-reference value is produced by the D/A circuit (implemented with the CCP peripheral) to provide the required compensation.

Setting LED brightness
Since the microcontroller core is only spending a small portion of time in the power-regulation process, more time can be dedicated to the user interface and to provide additional features, such as battery status monitoring and bright- ness level control. There are two ways that the LED light level can be adjusted using this circuit and software.

The first technique relies on the principle that the brightness of the LED will change with the drive current. In fact, an approximate linear control of the LED brightness can be accomplished using this method. However, variable current dimming is not the most efficient way to set the LED brightness level. The LED achieves its best efficiency at the maximum drive-current level specified by the manufacturer.

A low-frequency PWM signal of between 60Hz and 1kHz can be used to modulate the LED drive current. Instead of reducing the current drive level, the LED is always driven at maximum current during the on-time. The duty cycle of the PWM signal sets the average amount of time that the LED is energised.

The chosen PWM frequency should be sufficiently high so that the LED current is turned on and off at a rate that will not cause the human eye to detect flickering. The PWM frequency must also be low enough so that the current-regulation circuit has enough time to stabilise during the PWM on-time. If these conditions are met, the human eye will average the light output from the LED over time.

The PIC16HV785 contains all the required components to implement an efficient high power LED drive circuit. It can be easily configured for boost operation or buck-boost operation, depending on the input voltage range.

The application uses only a small portion of the microcontroller's RAM and Flash memory, leaving plenty of room for additional application code. With enough unused peripherals on the PIC16HV785 microcontroller, a second LED driver, battery charger, or other switch-mode circuit can also be implemented.


If one of the hobbyist readers chooses to build a LED Grow Light using a microcontroller please share your project with the rest of the LED grow light readers here, using your link or comment below.

Will LED Light Bulbs beat Solid State Lighting Advances?


Seems Matsushita Electric Works Panasonic announced details of a new solid state lighting product line and the research that surrounds it to the general public during the 21st International Vacuum Nanoelectronics Conference held in Poland last month.

Though the company claims their new silicon light bulb technology might one day be as important as LED and OLED lighting, it appears unlikely as Panasonic's BSD(Ballistic electron Surface-emitting Device)lighting technology doesn't currently have the potential to upset the lead that LED Lighting has, given the usable life (10,000 hours) and lumens per watt (100 lumens per Watt) that the data claims, not to mention the price point for LED Light Bulbs has been falling very fast.

This was developed in cooperation with the Graduate School of Engineering at the Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology, and most likely uses licensed technology from Group IV Semiconductor (in Canada)- which has developed a silicon chip that excites Xenon gas to emit UV light from within the vacuum bulb which in turn causes the phosphor to fluoresce.

Any Solid State Lighting technology, Silicon based or otherwise that can push forward Solid State Grow Lights is always a positive.

LED Lighting Replacement For Conventional HPS/HID Lights

LED Street Light
Though far from an LED Grow Light and not fine tuned for the wavelengths required by plants, this could be a direct solid state lighting replacement for Indoor Gardeners that currently use HID or HPS bulbs.

After four years of extensive Research & Development, Remco Solid State Lighting Inc., a Toronto, Canada-based SSL Solutions Company, has broken through the barrier to replace conventional street lighting with its recently patented SSL technology and LED-based street light.

Its disruptive SSL technology utilizes the dynamic resistance of LEDs providing a LED light engine that is up to 98% power efficient – only a 2% power loss that enables optimal power and LED lighting efficiencies. IES certified photometric lab results and successful pilot field-testing conducted at Camp Borden military base have verified these industry-leading levels of performance.

A number of companies have ventured into the LED street lighting market with varying degrees of success. Now, Remco Solid State Lighting has delved into this market utilizing its recently patented power efficient light engine and prototyped an LED Street Light for a truly equivalent LED replacement of the conventional cobra head street light.

“Real LED-based lighting application replacements for existing light sources must be direct lighting replacement solutions - lumen for lumen and LUX for LUX, plus offer the benefits of energy savings and reduced maintenance cost," stated Ron Russell, Remco’s CTO and inventor of Remco’s patented LED light engine. Not only is it scaleable to all lighting applications but it also offers a significant competitive advantage in high power LED lighting applications.

Conventional street lights typically use a high-pressure sodium bulb. Even non-technical people can see the difference in the picture. The CTO also conveyed that, despite having retrofitted a cobra head street light fixture with Remco’s proprietary thermal management and LED light engine using a stock HPS cobra head lens, Remco’s LED Street Light was able to outperform and produce more light at a greater efficiency than the conventional high-pressure sodium street light.

Mark Matthews, Remco's President and CEO stated, “What we strive to achieve with our SSL technology and LED lighting applications is equivalent useable lumens utilizing LEDs to replace conventional lighting with significant energy savings. Our Light engine is up to 98% power efficient and this technology is the key, especially in high power lighting applications."

According to Alex Savu, Energy Manager at Camp Borden military base in Canada (where the LED street light pilot test was performed), conventional HPS street lights consume 138 watts (100 watt HPS bulb plus the ballast which consumes an additional 38 watts) and the Remco prototype (a light engine and LED fixture within a cobra head fixture) consumed only 111 watts to generate 4770 useable lumens – a direct lighting replacement.

Matthews explained that, “While the test confirms only a 20% energy savings at 40.1 lumens per watt, these results are excellent considering that we have incorporated our LED fixture within a cobra head fixture and lost 20% of the lumens output absorbed by the standard HPS cobra head lens; whereas, we could have generated approximately 5300 useable lumens without the HPS lens.”

“When we complete our commercial product to replace all models of 100 watt HPS street lights (Note: the ballast also consumes 38 watts) with our patented LED light engine, proprietary thermal management and optics, utilizing 100 lumens/watt white LEDs, the commercial Remco LED street light luminaire will achieve approximately a 50% energy savings at 72 watts.”

It is estimated that there are 50 million 100 watt conventional street lights in North America, and we would like to replace all conventional street lights worldwide with Remco’s energy efficient LED Street Light as a contribution to help reduce Global Warming.

Alex Savu reported that since performing the tests, he has seen the superior performance of Remco's LED Street Light. He said, "The light is phenomenal. Basically, it is superior. It looks good!" He explained, "We would have to change our current units ten times before changing one of their units. The way we operate our lights, their units will last 27.4 years." (10 hours per day, seven days per week.)

Savu added, "Once we put theirs up, there were no complaints whatsoever." “However,” he said, "most of the other street lights we tested received complaints; either they were not bright enough or there was something wrong with the light."

In addition to its power efficient light engine for street lights, the company has developed a fully integrated pendant linear SSL luminaire prototype to replace fluorescent lighting capable of 66% energy savings as well fabricating prototypes of Edison-based LED bulbs with brightness levels equivalent to the incandescent bulbs they replace at energy savings of 85% to 95%!

Remco’s new LED light engine technology and SSL luminaires are gaining attention. In 2008 the company was selected as one of Canada’s Top Ten Cleantech technology companies by the Ottawa Centre for Research and Innovation.

Remco is on the verge of setting new standards in the Solid State Lighting industry and is currently seeking capital and licensing to major global lighting/fixture organizations and/or international distributors to collectively take a commanding lead in high power LED lighting applications.

Photo cutline: Remco’s Bright LED Street Light is in the foreground and conventional HPS street lights in the background.

Innovative Ultra-Efficient Polarized LED Wins $30K Prize


Martin Schubert’s polarized LED could improve LCD displays, save energy

Troy, N.Y. — In recent years, light emitting diodes (LEDs) have begun to change the way we see the world. Now, a Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute student has developed a new type of LED that could allow for their widespread use as light sources for liquid crystal displays (LCDs) on everything from televisions and computers to cell phones and cameras.

Martin Schubert, a doctoral student in electrical, computer, and systems engineering, has developed the first polarized LED, an innovation that could vastly improve LCD screens, conserve energy, and usher in the next generation of ultra-efficient LEDs. Schubert’s innovation has earned him the $30,000 Lemelson-Rensselaer Student Prize.

“In our community of innovators, the Lemelson-Rensselaer Student Prize recognizes our most inspired and dedicated students for their ingenuity and deep understanding of the greater global implications of their innovations,” said Rensselaer President Shirley Ann Jackson. “Martin Schubert is both a talented engineer and inspired entrepreneur. He launched his innovation not only because he had the engineering prowess, but because he also has a remarkable understanding of the technological, environmental, and energy saving outcomes his enlightened innovation will bring. Today we applaud him and the other finalists for their dedication and excellence, and we encourage them to continue to spark informed innovation around the world.”

Schubert is the second recipient of the $30,000 Lemelson-Rensselaer Student prize. The prize, which was first given in 2007, is awarded to a Rensselaer senior or graduate student who has created or improved a product or process, applied a technology in a new way, or otherwise demonstrated remarkable inventiveness.

For photos and video of the winner and award finalists, as well as a Webcast of the announcement ceremony, please visit: www.rpi.edu/lemelson.

The Next Generation of LEDs
Schubert’s polarized LED advances current LED technology in its ability to better control the direction and polarization of the light being emitted. With better control over the light, less energy is wasted producing scattered light, allowing more light to reach its desired location. This makes the polarized LED perfectly suited as a backlighting unit for any kind of LCD, according to Schubert. Its focused light will produce images on the display that are more colorful, vibrant, and lifelike, with no motion artifacts.

Schubert first discovered that traditional LEDs actually produce polarized light, but existing LEDs did not capitalize on the light’s polarization. Armed with this information, he devised an optics setup around the LED chip to enhance the polarization, creating the first polarized LED.

The invention could advance the effort to combine the power and environmental soundness of LEDs with the beauty and clarity of LCDs. Schubert expects that his polarized LED could quickly become commonplace in televisions and monitors around the world, replacing widely used fluorescent lights that are less efficient and laden with mercury. His innovation also could be used for street lighting, high-contrast imaging, sensing, and free-space optics, he said.

The Next Generation of Lighting Researcher
Schubert is the son of renowned lighting research expert and senior chair of the Rensselaer Future Chips Constellation, E. Fred Schubert. The younger Schubert, who received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Cornell University in electrical engineering, was set to pursue a career in computer chip development. But his father quickly identified his skills and ideas for the advancement of lighting technology and recruited him to join the large lighting research effort at Rensselaer.

“Martin Schubert has had the opportunity to work in one of the most advanced and well-known lighting research teams in the world,” said Rensselaer Dean of Engineering Alan Cramb. “And Schubert has shown that not only can he keep up in the lab, but he can also independently excel and innovate. His discovery of the first polarized LED marks an important advance in photonics technology that I am sure will resonate in photonics laboratories and companies around the world. Schubert is absolutely a young engineer to watch.”

Under the tutelage of his adviser, Michael Shur, the Patricia W. and C. Sheldon Roberts ’48 Professor of Solid State Electronics and director of the Rensselaer/IBM Center for Broadband Data Transfer Science and Technology, Schubert quickly excelled in the field. As soon as he arrived at Rensselaer, he began working nearly independently on his research, using some of the top research equipment available to the constellation, including a cutting-edge clean room laboratory.

During his time with Rensselaer Schubert has published three peer-reviewed, archival papers and filed for several patent applications on his polarized LEDs. In addition, Schubert is co-author of 15 other papers on related research, including a paper in one of the top journals in his field, Nature Photonics. The Nature research on the world’s first ideal anti-reflective coating was featured in media outlets around the world, from NPR’s “Morning Edition” to the London Daily Telegraph and Scientific American magazine.

Schubert is expected to complete his doctorate in electrical engineering this fall. After graduation he plans to pursue a career in semiconductor devices and photonics.

Schubert was born in Germany and grew up in New Jersey and later the Boston area.

The Lemelson Program
Schubert joins last year’s winner of the Lemelson-Rensselaer student prize, doctoral student Brian Schulkin. Schulkin, who invented the first portable terahertz sensing device, the “Mini-Z”, is currently working on an even smaller device and was recently named to the 2007 Scientific American 50 — the magazine’s prestigious annual list recognizing leadership in science and technology.

The $30,000 Lemelson-Rensselaer Student Prize is funded through a partnership with the Lemelson-MIT Program, which has awarded the $30,000 Lemelson-MIT Student Prize to outstanding student inventors at MIT since 1995. More information can be found at http://web.mit.edu/invent/.

Timothy Lu, a graduate student in the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology, is the 2008 winner for the $30,000 Lemelson-MIT Student Prize. Lu has invented processes that promise to enhance the effectiveness of antibiotics and help eradicate layers of bacteria known as biofilms, in order to combat bacterial infections, such as those caused by Escherichia coli biofilms and MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus). More information is available on http://web.mit.edu/invent/n-pressreleases/n-press-08SP.html.

The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign also joined Rensselaer as a new partner institution last year with the announcement of the $30,000 Lemelson-Illinois Student Prize. The winner of the 2008 Lemelson-Illinois Student Prize will be announced during a formal award ceremony on Feb. 28, 2008.

On May 26, the winners of all three student prizes will join together at MIT for a discussion and ceremony to honor all of the winners. In June, the winners will take part in the Lemelson-MIT Program’s second annual EurekaFest, a multiday event to celebrate the inventive spirit in Boston and Cambridge, Mass.

About the Lemelson-MIT Program
The Lemelson-MIT Program recognizes outstanding inventors, encourages sustainable new solutions to real-world problems, and enables and inspires young people to pursue creative lives and careers through invention. Jerome H. Lemelson, one of the world’s most prolific inventors, and his wife, Dorothy, founded the nonprofit Lemelson-MIT Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1994. More information is online at http://web.mit.edu/invent/.

About Rensselaer
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, founded in 1824, is the nation’s oldest technological university. The university offers bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees in engineering, the sciences, information technology, architecture, management, and the humanities and social sciences. Institute programs serve undergraduates, graduate students, and working professionals around the world. Rensselaer faculty are known for pre-eminence in research conducted in a wide range of fields, with particular emphasis in biotechnology, nanotechnology, information technology, and the media arts and technology. The Institute is well known for its success in the transfer of technology from the laboratory to the marketplace so that new discoveries and inventions benefit human life, protect the environment, and strengthen economic development.

Naturally I don't want to downplay the achievements or hard work of Mr. Martin's in any way, but looking over the finalists and entries while the watching the webcast of the award ceremony I personally think this prize may have been awarded improperly due to his fathers position at the institute. Though I may be biased in who should have won this award (as with the 2007 finalists; Eben Bayer and Greg Ten Eyck should have split last years prize), it seems many can innovate or build smaller widgets (and help pollute the planet), but few can truly help create a better world in which all species may live sustainably. Sure the work is great no doubt, but given the speed at which innovation(and the destruction of the planet) is progressing it may be a little late when one looks deeply at the bigger picture that is unfolding for all.

DIY High Performance LED Lighting System

Looks like the toadheads have done it again, this time a three (3) part series on on how to build your own DIY LED Lighting System the right way with off the shelf components! - these folks never cease to amaze me with the quality of technical articles published (especially if your an automotive gear head or overall geek like myself).

Turn on your LED Night Light and take a peek below!

Oh, and if the Jaycar Electronics link within the DIY LED Lighting article doesn't work don't fret it will be live again soon enough. Remember your exchange rate when calculating the actual cost for this project.

Part 1 : http://www.autospeed.com/A_109714/cms/article.html

Part 2 : http://www.autospeed.com/A_109715/cms/article.html

Part 3 : http://autospeed.com/cms/A_109716/article.html


Can't wait until these guys find the 15W HB LEDS to play around with.

LED 'Lighting for Tomorrow' Competition 2008

Solid State LED Lighting for TomorrowIts that time of year again for all of the DIY LED Grow Light Hobbyists to show some Lux, the official LED Lighting for Tomorrow Competition 2008 kicks off and plans on being the biggest yet, last years event attracted over 40 entries in the LED lighting category. If you fancy yourself a budding LED Grow Light specialist this could be your calling, and don't forget the fame and fortune if you win. Realize that the LED Lighting contest is mostly for general illumination which use Ultra-High Brightness (UHB) LEDs, but with a twist as this year a new "Future LED" Showcase category has been added and if an innovative technology entry for an indoor solid state LED plant light were to be received the judging panel wouldn't turn it away and your entry may even help create a new separate category for Solid State Plant Lighting in future LED Lighting Competitions.

This years Solid State Lighting (SSL) competition is organized by the U.S. Department of Energy, the American Lighting Association, and the Consortium for Energy Efficiency.

Important Dates to remember if you plan on entering:

January 17-21, 2008 - Lighting for Tomorrow 2008 Competition Launched at the Dallas Lighting Market

February 29, 2008 - Online Intent-to-submit form is due. (I recommend using the PDF version which is more complete, they ask that you only use one form of submission and both are due by the above date)

April 30, 2008 - All entries due

September 14-16, 2008 - Lighting for Tomorrow 2008 Competition Winners Announced at the American Lighting Association Annual Conference

Rules and Entrant Guides: For complete information on the LED Lighting design contest including applications, competition rules, guidelines, and sponsors visit: 2008 Lighting for Tomorrow Competition

Don't forget to take a look at the some of the photos from last years winners in the LED Lighting Fixtures (LLF) division for ideas on what the competition is doing with LEDs and Solid State Lighting.

This year the LED Lighting Fixtures (LLF) division has three (3) categories: 1) fixtures meeting the ENERGY STAR for solid-state lighting (SSL) requirements, 2) other decorative entries such as chandeliers, sconces, table lamps and portables using LEDs with device efficacy of at least 50 lm/W, and 3) the new "Future LED" category which invites luminaires using the world's highest efficiency LEDs; The “Future LED” category will require a minimum LED device efficacy of 90 lm/W, which would fit the bill nicely for an LED Grow Light entry.

LED lighting applications in the 'near term' and 'other lighting' categories include:

􀂉 Under-cabinet lighting for kitchens
􀂉 Portable desk/task light
􀂉 Recessed downlight rated for residential use
􀂉 Outdoor porch light
􀂉 Outdoor step light
􀂉 Outdoor pathway light
􀂉 Wall sconce
􀂉 Table or floor lamp
􀂉 Pendant
􀂉 Chandelier
􀂉 Vanity light
􀂉 Ceiling fan w/ light kit

But the 'Future LED Showcase' is wide open with a write-in of your choice, so what will you build next? A rotating LED grow light with LED light arms that track or sweep around for greater coverage could be one idea :)

Start up your wire-wrapping grow light engines and lets get this showcase shining!

For more information or to ask questions contact: Ruth Taylor, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory - 509-375-2389, ruth.taylor@pnl.gov

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.

100W LED Grow Light with 3640 Lumens


Solid State LED Grow Lights are gaining traction again, this time with a press release from Dialight (Lumidrives) reporting that the Canadian Standards Association (CSA) has certified for sale its new state of the art SafeSite fixture for sale. Dialight reportedly designed its SafeSite fixture to replaces conventional 175W to 250W metal- halide and high-pressure sodium light sources with 100W LED technology for hazardous location applications. CSA Certification involves stringent testing and requires that all wiring be done with CSA-approved materials.

Additional features and benefits include:

Low power consumption
Universal input supply (120 - 277 VAC)
Suitable for all Class 1, Div 2, Groups A, B, C, D
hazardous environments T4A rated
Patent pending optical design
State of the art solid state lighting source
Self-contained wiring compartment eliminates
additional junction boxes
Weather/corrosion resistant lamp assembly and housing
5 year warranty
Resistant to shock and vibration
Instant on / off response
Wide operating voltage range
Power factor > .9
THD < 20%

This is more good news for anyone looking for a stand alone fixture that could be safely used indoors as LED Grow Lights. The newly approved Solid State Lighting fixture weighs 19lbs and consumes 85-115W (100W nominal) at 110 volts; for a total output of 3640 Lumens ( 70% lumen maintenance over 50,000 operating hours ). Now if they could start offering other models in different spectrums as LED Grow Lights everyone would have a happy holiday season to rejoice over.

Photonic Lattice LEDs are new class of light-emitting device

A bit older, but LEDsmagazine had reported new Solid State LED lighting technology:

Using photonic lattice technology it is possible to build large-area chips that enable ultra-high power sources for projection and other applications, writes Robert Karlicek of Luminus Devices.
The term “power LED” usually describes one of two types of LED assemblies: a conventional 1 mm2 power chip in a power package, or an array of chips (1 mm2 or smaller) combined in one of several different types of power packaging formats (semiconductor chip(s), package, encapsulant and heat sink).

While the performance of power LED devices has improved dramatically over the past 10 years, the basic concepts haven’t changed too much over the past forty years: one or more small LED semiconductor chips attached to a metal packaging structure and covered by an encapsulant/lens to help extract and shape the light output.

Conventional power LEDs have gradually evolved through incremental improvements in semiconductor and packaging materials and manufacturing processes.

Here we describe a new generation of ultra-high-power photonic lattice LEDs, which operate at input powers as high as 100 W and are orders of magnitude brighter than conventional power LEDs. These are the first commercially available LEDs using photonic crystal concepts to manage light extraction from the LED.

Now a 100W per package is impressive no doubt, hopefully this finds itself into the LED Grow Light segment soon.

Taiwan LED Chip maker VPEC gains New patent in the US market

Visual Photonics Epitaxy (VPEC), a Taiwan-based high brightness LED chip maker, recently announced that the company has secured a patent for LEDs with a reflective layer in the USA market, according to a company filing with the Taiwan Stock Exchange (TSE).

Market sources also citied in a recent Chinese-language Economic Daily News (EDN) report indicated that the patent is similar to patents 5008718, 5376580 and 5502316 which Lumileds secured in 1989-1995.

More great news for the High Brightness LED Solid State Lighting industy.

LED chip maker Genesis Photonics announces new patents for white LEDs

Digitimes is reporting that:

Taiwan-based LED chip supplier Genesis Photonics yesterday debuted its latest patents on white LED technology which the company claims can produce a white LED chip without the need to combine a blue LED and phosphor.

Around two years ago, Genesis started volume production of single white LED chips using this technology with most of the products shipping to Japan, said the company. The production cost for this product is not far off from traditional blue and green LEDs. However, as the brightness of LEDs produced using this technology is still not as bright as ordinary ones, few LED makers are adopting the technology and Genesis is partnering with downstream vendors directly, stated company president Hsu Shi-Hong (transliterated from Chinese).

The company also aims for the proportion of revenues from the blue and green LED segments to reach up to 60% and 40%, respectively, in 2008, up from 45% and 55%, respectively at present, the company added. Meanwhile, the company will increase the number of its metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) equipment to over 25 units by the end of 2008, compared to 19 units now, noted the LED chip company.

This should be great news for the overall health of the Solid State LED lighting market, more competition in the LED Grow Light industry is always good.

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.

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.

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."

Lamina Unveils LED Replacement for Popular Halogen Bulb

It's amazing how far the industry has come in a few months.. Very Long-Lived Lamina SoL(TM) MR16 LED Offers Big Energy and Replacement Cost Savings

Lamina, developer of the brightest commercially available LEDs, today announced immediate availability of an LED-based replacement lamp designed as a direct, ready-to-plug-in retrofit for 20-watt MR-16 halogen and comparable compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs). The first of its kind, the Lamina SoL™ MR16 LED integrates a high power light source, optical lens and thermal heat sink shell in a traditional MR-16 halogen form-factor. This innovative design, which fits most existing fixtures, produces as much light as the 20-watt halogen bulb it replaces, but consumes less than 8 watts of electricity

Lamina SoL MR16 LED replacement lamps are designed to provide the quality of light produced by traditional incandescent lamps. Warm color temperatures of 3050°K and color rendition index (CRI) values greater than 80 make these products ideal as halogen replacements. Higher color temperature lamp equivalents of 4700°K are also available. The products will be demonstrated at Lightfair International 2007, May 8-10, in New York City.

"Lamina's SoL MR16 LED light engine offers a significant return-on-investment," said Frank M. Shinneman, the company's president and CEO. "With a lifetime of more than 50,000 hours, the energy savings, replacement cost savings of traditional lamps and money saved in labor costs to replace burned out lamps can potentially add up to more than $700 per fixture." Adding to the value, Mr. Shinneman noted that the Lamina SoL MR16 LED emits no heat (infrared) or ultraviolet radiation in its light beam, is readily dimmable, and contains no mercury (as do fluorescent lamps) or lead. As are all Lamina LED light engines, the SoL MR16 LED is fully compliant with the EU's RoHS Directive restricting mercury, lead, cadmium and other hazardous substances. Pricing is expected to be less than $25 in OEM volumes.

Among many possible applications, Lamina SoL MR16 LEDs are ideal for:

-- Track lighting
-- Display case fixtures & cabinet lighting
-- Aerospace lighting systems
-- Bio-medical and medical applications
-- Elevator lighting
-- General, architectural and landscape lighting
-- Signage and back lighting
-- Industrial OEM equipment lighting
-- Retail sales display
-- Cruise ship and yacht lighting

Earlier this month, Lamina introduced new light engines with outputs as bright as many traditional bulbs used in home, office, retail, commercial and exterior applications. The TitanTurbo(TM) line represents the state-of-the-art in high-output LED light engines. It is immediately available to lighting application designers in 2 models that deliver more than 2,000 lumens in daylight white and more than 1,000 lumens in warm white light. The company demonstrated both versions to much acclaim in Milan, Italy, at Euroluce, Europe's premier lighting show. Along with Lamina's SoL MR16 LED, TitanTurbo also will debut in the U.S. at Lightfair.

All Lamina LED light engines are manufactured by combining high brightness LEDs from industry-leading LED manufacturers with the company's own proprietary packaging technology. This technology is a breakthrough in thermal performance for LED packaging, a key factor in determining LED life and reliability. Unmatched thermal performance coupled with package interconnectivity allows Lamina to densely cluster multiple LEDs to achieve exceptionally high luminous intensity in very small footprints.

Lamina also provides unmatched integration support. Experienced sales application engineers, knowledgeable in LED design integration, optics, thermal management and electronics, are just a phone call away.

About Lamina, Inc.

Lamina, Inc. defines the state of technology with the development and manufacture of high power LED light engines. Lamina's LED packaging technology provides unsurpassed thermal management and interconnectivity.

Lamina is the leading manufacturer of high power LED light engines and is leading the transition from traditional lighting such as incandescent, halogen and mercury vapor fluorescent to solid state solutions for general lighting. Lamina offers the brightest solid state light engines in the industry and is enabling this lighting evolution by delivering highly reliable and functional LED lighting solutions. The company is supported by an industry-leading global sales and distribution network.

Lumidrives high power LEDs for general lighting

A step in the direction of LED Grow Lights for Plants.

York-based Lumidrives and the University of Manchester are to develop technology for next-generation LED lighting modules in a £330,000 project part-funded by the DTI.

“Manchester has a lot of knowledge of power electronics in extreme environments and heatsinking,” Lumidrives’ managing director Gordon Routledge said.

“The concept may sound trivial, but our five years’ experience in the LED lighting industry shows that the thermal requirements of LED devices represent the biggest challenge in most applications for general lighting,” he said.

Street lighting has been chosen as the target application. “You have to generate over 12,000lm from 240V,” said Routledge. “The obvious thing is to have a big heatsink on the top of the light, but when you start to think about it, you realise muck from birds will soon choke it up. It is a complex problem which may require heat pipes and all sorts of novel methods.”

Dr Roger Shuttleworth from the university’s power conversion group is just setting up the Manchester research. “We will be making a general-purpose light engine. Reliability is an issue, so is heat,” he says. “We may have to think of technologies like heat pumps to control it. And if we are powering it off the mains we will probably need a power supply with a unity power factor.”

Over 50,000 hours - 10 years - is the life target. Older ‘yellow’ street lighting uses low-pressure sodium lamps which are some of the most efficient sources available, between 150 and 300lm/W.

In the past decade or so there has been a move to replace these with whiter, more aesthetically pleasing but less efficient (85lm/W) high-pressure sodium lamps. White LEDs are currently on sale at 70lm/W and are on track for 150lm/W and 400lm/W in the near future.

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.