New developments in the industry significantly increase the prospects of completely replacing today’s incandescent light bulbs with extremely low-consumption LED devices.
Two of the three largest manufacturers in the industry, Osram Sylvania and Philips, plan to bring to market later this year LED bulbs that can replace the incandescent lamp we all use most often, the 60-watt.
General Electric will release a 40-watt-equivalent LED this year, but will not have its 60-watt version ready until next year.
The incentive for development in this direction comes from new US federal legislation that takes effect in January 2012 and will require new bulbs to be 30% more efficient than today’s incandescent bulbs.
The Osram Ultra and the Philips EnduraLED, which will be available in stores in the fourth quarter of the year, will use only 12 watts to deliver the output of a 60-watt incandescent, and will be closer to it in both design and weight.
LED lamps use 80% less energy than an ordinary incandescent lamp and last up to 25,000 hours, compared with 2,000 hours for an incandescent and 8,000 for a fluorescent bulb. In practice, that equates to 17 years if the lamp is switched on for four hours a day.
These companies want to begin selling the new bulbs while avoiding the mistakes made when the first fluorescent products were launched, which lit our homes with a harsh white light and had a short life, and also contained small amounts of mercury.
They now claim that, unlike fluorescent products, the new LEDs imitate standard incandescent lamps perfectly. They are dimmable, emit light in all directions, give almost the same impression of warmth and have a color range like that of incandescent bulbs.
As for prices, GE expects its 40-watt equivalent to cost $40 to $50, while both Osram Sylvania and Philips believe initial retail prices will be around $60. The three major companies promise that, through supporting development programs, they will offer lower prices in the future.
Source: The New York Times
Text: Giorgos Konstantinidis
