Resources: Why use LEDs?

Did you know that LEDs last 50 times longer than incandescent lighting and 10 times longer than fluorescent. Along with their long life, here is a list of benefits to using LED's in the built environment that I found on the illumivision website.

Benefits:

Extremely long life
highly efficient
Compact and low-profile design
Breakage resistant
Cold temperature operation
Instant on
Rapid cycling capability
Controllability
No IR or UV emissions
Directional light emission

This is an underpass that Walter Hood designed for Splash Pad Park in Oakland. This application can be achieved easily with LEDs. You can see a showcase of projects both indoor and out here.

Additional Resources:

Using Light-Emitting Diodes - US Department of Energy

LED Lighting Technology - LandscapeForms

Please feel free to leave your comments below. Thanks!

Tags: LED, Lighting

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Comment by Thomas J. Johnson on December 12, 2010 at 4:01am: CFLs were hideous when they first came out. Now you can't tell the difference in light from an incandescent. I think LEDs are going to evolve quickly. They already have warmer (amber, golden, whatever) colors, and pretty much any other color you can think of. I see no reason why their manufacture shouldn't get as cheap as microchips ($.002/each) but they've got a long way to go on price until they're realistic. I was at the Home Depot today and they had LED bulbs going for $29.00 for one!! I picked up 4 CFLs for $1.85 instead...

Comment by Zach Watson on December 11, 2010 at 7:31pm: I really like the future of LED's for most projects. The only place that I do not like LED's are for Christmas lights, they have a funny cold glow that I do not like for decorating a house. Other then that I say bring 'em on!!

Zach

Comment by Steve Mercer on December 11, 2010 at 11:39am: Hi Andrew,

My uncle just retired from GELighting as an electrical engineer. While visting we had a discussion about LED lights. His comment is that the yeild on quailty LED's is still realatively low. That is why you see real cheap LED flashlights at the store that don't seem to hold up very long. (They are seconds that don't meet Q&C standards. Until this problem is solved the price of quality LED's will continue to be High. So check your pocket book before dashing out on some big project. You might be embarrased at the cost.

s.

Comment by Thomas J. Johnson on December 10, 2010 at 9:38pm: LEDs are where it's at, or where it will be at...

In addition to being energy efficient, having an infinite range of colors/shades, they are also going to be increasingly cheap to manufacture and in turn profitable. Compact florescent bulbs will be a flash in the pan, a short lived phase. In addition to the benefits mentioned above, LEDs are also more environmentally sound than CFLs.

LEDs also make killer mountain bike lights...