In your home, lighting may be 10 percent of your bill. But in an office building it¡¯s probably 40 percent, and so if you reduce your lighting energy consumption by a large fraction, the savings will be huge,¡± said James Brodrick, who leads the DOE¡¯s solid-state lighting program.

A fact sheet from Brodrick¡¯s office says this about LEDs: ¡°In the coming decade, they will become a key to affordable net-zero energy buildings, buildings that produce at least as much energy annually as they use from the grid.¡±

The technology is advancing quickly, and costs will continue to drop, Brodrick said. The DOE tests LEDs and sets performance and efficiency guidelines under its Energy Star program.

LEDs are directional lights, used in recessed lighting and under-counter lights, for example. They¡¯re not yet available as bulbs that cast light all around and fit in ordinary sockets.

¡°There¡¯s an enormous and exciting potential, but we have a long way to go before we see anything besides directional lighting,¡± said Jeffrey P. Harris, the vice president for programs at the Alliance to Save Energy, a nonprofit group that promotes energy efficiency.

Even so, LEDs already are used to light offices, hotels, restaurants and other businesses.

The DOE predicts that LEDs will have better performance capability than fluorescent lighting in the next few years, and that they¡¯ll continue to improve after that. They¡¯re now comparable with fluorescent fixtures in efficiency, and the DOE says its Energy Star LEDs last two to five times longer.

Cost is the biggest reason that LEDs aren¡¯t used more widely, Brodrick said.

LEDs have other advantages: They can be dimmed, don¡¯t emit heat, don¡¯t contain mercury ¨C unlike compact fluorescents ¨C and can produce warm-toned light.

Home Depot, the world¡¯s biggest retailer of light bulbs, is starting to stock LED bulbs this summer and plans to have 10 kinds by September, said Jorge Fernandez, who¡¯s in charge of light bulb purchases for the company.

Philips is working on many kinds of LEDs, including one to replace a 40-watt incandescent bulb that¡¯s scheduled to be available next year, she said.

Derrick Hall of RE/Construct Inc. in Asheville, N.C., said that residential customers weren¡¯t asking for LEDs because of the high upfront cost. Still, he¡¯s hearing of some nonresidential customers who are looking into LEDs for the energy savings.

LEDs are much better than other lighting options, Hall said. The quality of the light is ¡°far superior,¡± they offer big energy savings and there¡¯s no cost to society for dealing with mercury, he said. Mercury, a neurotoxin, is found in small amounts in compact fluorescent bulbs.

Lighting up the landscape at night not only creates a magical picture to look at from indoors or out, but adds safety and makes the garden more usable after dark. Following the popularity of low-voltage and solar lights, the use of LED lights in the landscape is blossoming. Up until now LED lights have been lacking in brightness compared to the competition, but new LEDs are now available in a variety of forms, colors and intensities never before seen. Here is some information on how to use LED lights in the landscape.

• Step 1

  You can use LED lights in the landscape to create spot lighting, glowing areas or focal points. The LED (light-emitting diode) is a source of light that uses 1/10th the energy of the incandescent mini light bulbs. It lasts more than three times longer and does not heat up. It is more practical in many ways, but has been somewhat expensive to buy. Now the cost of LEDs have become competitive with other lights and choosing LED lighting for the garden is a great idea.

• Step 2

  LEDs come in decorative colors that are more intense than other lighting. That makes them ideal for decorative uses. There are a number of companies that specialize in decorations created by end-to-end strands of lighting that can be formed into just about any image to decorate your house or landscape for holidays or to create special effects.

• Step 3

  You can now choose LEDs for most garden fixtures from spotlights to walkway lights.

• Step 4

  For more information on how to use LED lights in the landscape, please check some of the links provided below under Resources.

There are literally millions on fluorescent tubes in use today, all over Australia.  While there have been advances in fluorescent lamps recently, most light fittings in use still use 36 Watt tubes.  Additionally, fluorescent tubes require a ballast to generate the voltages needed to start the light and these ballasts may use around 12 Watts  each.  So each tube may consume around 48 Watts.

There are a a variety of options manufacturers making LED Tube lights that will fit in existing fluorescent light fittings, however, you will need to get a licensed electrician to modify the fitting as the LED tubes do not requite either the Starter or the Ballast that is required for the fluorescent tubes.

LED Tubes, depending on the manufacturer and light output will generall consume between 15 and 22 watts.  This represents a reduction between 54 to 69% on electricity consumption.  In addition you could expect many years of use from each tube which will reduce ongoing maintenance costs.

Various suppliers can be found on the Internet that can provide more information on the suitabilty of LED Tube lights for your situation.  Just Google LED Lights your region.

A Light Emitting Diode (LED) is a semiconductor device which converts electricity into light. LED lighting has been around since the 1960s, but is just now beginning to appear in the residential market for space lighting. At first white LEDs were only possible by "rainbow" groups of three LEDs — red, green, and blue — by controlling the current to each to yield an overall white light. This changed in 1993 when Nichia created a blue indium gallium chip with a phosphor coating that is used to create the wave shift necessary to emit white light from a single diode. This process is much less expensive for the amount of light generated.

Each diode is about 1/4 inch in diameter and uses about ten milliamps to operate at about a tenth of a watt. LEDs are small in size, but can be grouped together for higher intensity applications. LED fixtures require a driver which is analogous to the ballast in fluorescent fixtures. The drivers are typically built into the fixture (like fluorescent ballasts) or they are a plug transformer for portable (plug-in) fixtures. The plug-in transformers allow the fixture to run on standard 120 volt alternating current (AC), with a modest (about 15 to 20 percent) power loss.

The efficacy of a typical residential application LED is approximately 20 lumens per watt (LPW), though efficacies of up to 100 LPW have been created in laboratory settings. Incandescent bulbs have an efficacy of about 15 LPW and ENERGY STAR® qualified compact fluorescents are about 60 LPW, depending on the wattage and lamp type. Some manufacturers claim efficacies much higher than 20 LPW; make sure to examine system efficacy, which accounts for the power use of all components. In December 2006, the U.S. Department of Energy studied the efficacy of four luminaries. All four fell short of the manufacturers’ claims; the study implies that manufacturers are relying on measurements of how much light an isolated LED produces, rather than how much light an LED luminaire actually delivers.

LEDs are better at placing light in a single direction than incandescent or fluorescent bulbs. Because of their directional output, they have unique design features that can be exploited by clever designs. LED strip lights can be installed under counters, in hallways, and in staircases; concentrated arrays can be used for room lighting. Waterproof, outdoor fixtures are also available. Some manufacturers consider applications such as gardens, walkways, and decorative fixtures outside garage doors to be the most cost-efficient.

LED Light for you opens a new dimension in business relations between you and your partners. Using our network you can now easily contact a wide range of LED light products worldwide.

We have a number of joint factory to provide you with product, Key products include LED Tube Light, LED Panel Light , LED Strip, Led Downlight, also we can supply LED Bulb, LED Bar Lights etc.

All partners can assure you the highest level of quality, know how and service.

Fans of the popular TLC show American Chopper will witness a first when they tune in this Thursday, November 5 at 9 p.m. ET/PT. The Orange County Choppers (OCC) crew -- founder Paul Sr., -- forges new territory with the creation of their first electric-powered chopper. Another first is the use throughout the bike of LED lighting for head, tail and signal lighting. Supplied by OSRAM SYLVANIA, the lighting array includes the first OEM installation of OSRAM SYLVANIA LEDs in a motorcycle head lighting application. The lighting company partnered with its sister companies Valeo Sylvania to develop a state-of-the-art headlamp cluster assembly and OSRAM Opto Semiconductors to provide high-powered LED chips.

The Smart Chopper's 4.5-inch custom headlamp design utilizes an OSRAM JFL2-based JOULE(TM) system. The JFL2 is the latest addition to a family of LED lighting solutions designed to offer the standardization of current automotive systems in a compact, energy-efficient package.

Along with the JFL2 JOULE(TM) system, the Siemens Smart Chopper features: two Amber LED "MonoLED" one-inch dome front turn signals; two example lamps for use of "dome and tunnel" style design for the tail lamps (red stop and amber turn signal); two boards each with six OSRAM Opto Semiconductors Advanced Power TOPLED in red and yellow for front and rear turn signals; one LINEARlight Flex Top Colormix system for Red-Green-Blue (RGB) body  lighting.

The Siemens Smart Chopper was built for Siemens Corp., a global powerhouse in electronics and electrical engineering. It integrates an Advanced DC Motors Inc. Series Wound 8" electric motor and clutchless one-speed drive system with a long-sleek frame and radical custom bodywork made from new and recycled materials.

LEDnovation, Inc. today introduced two new LED bulbs for the North American Market. The company claims that the LED bulbs are the industry¡¯s first and highest brightness 60W and 75W incandescent A19 equivalent replacement bulbs. 

The 60W equivalent delivers 600 Lumens with a typical efficiency of 79 Lumens/Watt and consumes 7.6 W. The bulb consumes 87% less power than a standard 60W incandescent bulb and 42% less than a standard 13W Compact Fluorescent. The 75W equivalent delivers 700 Lumens with a typical efficiency of 71 Lumens/Watt and consumes 9.8W. This lamp consumes 86% less power than a standard 75W incandescent bulb. Both LED bulbs have a CCT =3500K, typical CRI of 85 and power factor >0.9. The Lamps feature Recycled Reflectance? optics technology, which reduces overall glare and delivers an extremely uniform and smooth light output in the A19 standard form factor.

The products are targeted at downlight and other indoor general lighting applications in the commercial and industrial markets. These next generation bulbs are part of the EnhanceLite? series of LED bulbs. LEDnovation¡¯s 60W equivalent LED A19-60-1N-I and 75W equivalent LED A19-75-1N-I products are scheduled to be commercially available in November 2009 for the North American market.