In an effort to create the highest possible performance in a portable lighting product, assembling the right combination of components is essential. Obviously the process begins with an efficient LED suited to the lighting effect desired. The LED must then be matched with an efficient driver. Finally, the driver must be fed power from an efficient power supply that converts incoming AC line voltage to clean DC power. Efficiency is generally found in matching the load of the LED to a driver designed for that load with no necessary over-capacity. Then, mating the driver to an efficient power supply matched in size to the driver’s operating load is necessary to produce the highest combined efficiency.

In addition to these core efficiencies are two additional factors; Power Factor and Off -State Power Consumption.

Power factor reflects the ratio of the real watts and the actual current presented by the product on the building electrical system. PF also reflects how much actual energy is required from the utility to operate the product. A power fact of 0.5 indicates that the real power in watts represents only 50% of the actual volt-amps, or current that is required to support the product. a PF of .90 means that the watts represents 90% of the current. While it is easy to set this aside when looking at one or two small loads, the effect adds up. For example, a 20A, 120V circuit can support 87 20W fixtures with a PF of .90, but only 64 with a PF of .50.

Off-State Power Consumption is the amount of energy a product consumes in the power supply circuit when the product is turned off. This applies mainly to task and portable products that have switches or controls separate of the mains voltage control. Depending on the type of power supply employed, the off-state power consumption can be insignificant, less than 3/10ths of a watt. In others, it can be high. This is energy consumed with no lighting benefit in lighting produced.

It is interesting to note at this point that dimming has a significant impact on all of these factors. As the dimmed load drops, power supply fixed power losses become a greater portion of the total energy consumed, so efficiency drops. If the approach to power factor is passive (fixed low cost design), as the load drops, the power factor correction becomes less effective, and the PF drops. It is not uncommon to see a driver/power supply combination start at 100% load / 85% efficiency / .90PF – drop to 45% efficiency / .40PF at a 40% dimmer setting. The same applies to power supplies that are larger than the connected load. In many cases a power supply with 83% efficiency will drop significantly with loads less than 80% of full rated load. Passive PF correction will have a similar response. For this reason, to avoid every individual product requiring a power supplies need to be designed with a unique power supply to fit the connected load, power supplies need to be designed to remain efficient over a load range for application to dimmed products as well as a range of LED loads. This will likely demand use of active PF correction strategies, to avoid the PF failing to meet requirements for loads less than 100% of nameplate rating. These power supplies also need to be rated for continuous duty at the connected load, which often demands a load less than maximum, where the peak efficiency and PF is measured for standard products today.

Now to the problem:

For portable products  less than 20W that use remote power supplies there is a significant issue in assembling the components required to attain high performance in all of these areas. Bottom line – there are no high power factor, high efficiency remote DC power supplies available on the market, none… nada. The vast majority of OTS (Off The Shelf) AC/DC power supplies are designed around electronic component use, under UL60950-1. While these are technically Class 2 by NEC definition and  considered Class 2 by UL – Energy Star requires “UL1310″ Class 2 power supplies, with a PF of .90, ES Level V efficiency for any remote power supply used in portable lighting. Level V efficiency is primarily targeted at attaining an off-state consumption of <0.3W.

The following table shows a summary of tests accomplished on several driver/power supply combinations to illustrate what can be expected from products currently available to product manufacturers (Tasca product development results).

As can be seen here, while attaining a high efficiency can be accomplished with the careful selection of a power supply and driver well matched to the LED load, attaining a high power factor is not attainable.

Note that in the combination labeled “RT”, a high power factor was attained, but the design significantly reduced efficiency, and increased off-state power consumption. This is due to the design of the product, which utilizes a large coil wound transformer, which reduces sine wave interference that cuts into PF results.

The following illustrates the trade-offs involved in selecting the components when using current OTS components available today.

Based on testing of existing power supplies available, one can achieve one leg of this triangle with some ease. However, there are no .90PF power supplies available in power supplies under 100W, so anyone attempting to attain Energy Star for portable products using remote AC/DC adapters is out of luck. This leaves the Off-State power and Efficiency leg as the only available options, which can be found from several producers. However, all high efficiency, level V (>.3W off-state) products are UL60950-1 listed, which is not compliant with the ES demand for UL1310 listing, again leaving portable manufacturers out of luck

Ideally, a power supply with a high efficiency to support strong lumen/W efficacy, combined with high power factor, and low off-state power consumption would enhance any portable lighting product. Even considering the low actual loads involved, in facilities that use a large number of portable task lights would benefit from these performance levels.

For the near term, if Energy Star is interested in seeing portable lighting products in compliance, a reduction in the PF requirement is called for. otherwise, it is unlikely there will be any broad participation in this class of product.

No Current  Solution

As noted, there are no power supplies available that meet the requirements set by Energy Star. Development of such a source is an expensive proposition on all levels. First, a custom power supply that can attain all of the desired performance results mentioned here costs in excess of $25,000 in design, prototype, pre-production development and tooling. UL listing, and compliance testing will add another $12,000 minimum, plus the cost of first inventories, production setup, etc… By the time a power supply is created that can satisfy the efficiency necessary to produce desirable product efficacy, meet Energy Star efficacy, PF, Level V, and UL1310 listing, a sum of around $50,000 will be spent. To complicate matters, the costs of power factor correction circuits are such that designing the power supply for a very narrow load range is necessary to utilize a passive circuit design. Active circuits to support a wide range power supply (load range from 14W to 20W for example) adds significantly to the total cost of the power supply. In the end, while one can obtain power supplies with UL60950-1 listing, with efficiencies of >80% (.60PF) for $18, the cost of a custom made, a UL1310 high PF (.90) with passive circuit  is roughly $25, while a wide range power supply with high PF will run on the order of $30. While all of this may seem inconsequential to a massive corporation, it has a significant damping effect on the larger number of product producers who will simply do nothing until this can be solved without this level of cost and expense. even for manufacturers who have obtained a customized power supply, Lumenique tests have shown that there are none that have attained the requisite .90PF, few that have attained the UL1310 Class2 listing, and not one portable task lighting product has attained Energy Star (based on 1/12/2011 ES product listing). The lack of a viable Class 2 power supply is likely a significant factor in this.

To illustrate how frustrating this can be, the following is a compliance status for TASCA showing how all necessary issues have been addressed, save those associated with the power supply. Black results are those we attain regardless of power supply, based on the products design and driver selection. Green are results we attain with our current power supply, and red indicates results we are in need of improvement in order to attain Energy Star performance.

Call for Action

This is an open appeal to those who produce power supplies. The portable lighting market is a $1B+ market segment and a perfect match to LED technology. The reason a remote AC/DC adapter is so compelling in this product segment is that it supports the scale of product well, and is far less problematic for UL listing of the finished product.  Using a small driver, or LED board integrated driver, with a remote voltage conversion also creates produces that can be internationally marketed far more easily than carrying line voltage into the fixture itself. The UL1310 Class 2, combined with high efficiency, .90 PF, and <.3W off-state are good standards, that should be attainable. The power range to suit the vast majority of products could be attained in two power supplies; a 7-14W unit, and a 15W to 20W unit. The demand for both will be high, as there will be a need for small semi-decorative products for home and small office use, and high output products for commercial and industrial applications.  At TASCA, we use a 15W power supply today, with a need for 20W in the near future. We are not alone, with a very large number of portable lighting manufacturers, and potential start ups in this segment, that would all respond positively to availability of a product that would facilitate them attaining Energy Star compliance for their efforts. We can now attain the LED efficacy and optical efficiencies necessary, and meet all other criteria to hit this target – All that is holding us back is the availability of a viable power supply.

I am asked by electronic and SSL providers where there are opportunities to fill product needs in the market. Well, here is a product need that in nearly 2 years of trying I have not been successful finding a partner to provide a solution. While I do have an option to create a custom solution, I hesitate, as I know that this is a larger market need, that when filled by a mass produced solution will make anything I do on a custom level obsolete. All that is needed are two power supplies, either in a thin desktop or compact plug-in configuration, that meet the criteria outlined by Energy Star, including UL1310, and UL8750 compliance, that manufacturers can include in their own UL product efforts, that will facilitate ES compliance.

If you or anyone you know is able to produce an efficient, high PF 24VDC power supply meeting these requirements, please help, or ask them to help! I will gladly share specifications we have collected for the power supply we need at Tasca. If I find anything that will solve this problem, I will buy the product and post everything about it here, make a big deal about its discovery, offer them for sale at the Lumenique Product Center – and be eternally grateful, as will many others jammed up by this problem.  Failing that, is there anyone interested in working with us, either financially, or as a joint venture, to pursue developing a unique product we can market against all other available power supplies in the portable lighting market? Since many LED task lights now short of ES compliance will be able to attain the performance required with only a change in power supply, it appears a latent demand worth pursuing.

Power Metrics:

Without going into a long boring discussion of the differences between apparent, real, and reactive power is, here are a couple of simple definitions to work from:

Volt-Amps (VA) = the product of a lighting products current (Amps) multiplied by the voltage applied. Also known as Apparent Power, as this represents the amount of current drawn from the electrical system during operation. Apparent Power is what utility companies must generate in order to support the loads placed on power grids and systems.

Watt (W) = a measure of work accomplished by a system equivalent to the theoretic volts of a system multiplied by its current (VA), with no other loss, inductive or reactive factors involved. Also known as Active Power, the assumption in all Watt metric  statements is that there is perfect Unity between Active Power and Apparent Power, which exists in pure resistance loads. An example of a product that presents this simple load, where a 60W lamp draws .5A from a 120V power source – 60W = 60VA. Active Power is what residential electric meters measure, as this is a simple and cheap metering strategy.

Power Factor (PF) = the difference between Apparent Power and Active Power. PF = W/VA. The loss of energy from systems with Power Factors less than 1.0, is sometimes referred to as Reactive Power.

When a system has a Power Factor of .50, this means that their will be a difference in the measured watts of the load and actual energy demand it presents of 50%. For example, a 60W load with a power factor of .50, actually requires 120VA of power in operation. Since VA is what is needed from the utility system, for the purposes of saving energy consumed by lighting systems, VA is the most important metric. For calculating financial impact based on watts measured by the meter on a home, Watts is the metric used. However, for commercial customers, who either pay a tarrif based on total system power factor, or are charged based on Apparent Power Consumed, VA and PF are far more important.

To repeat – For the purposes of representing actual energy saved by a lighting product, VA, or Apparent Power is the most important metric, not Watts. This is particularly true of electronic systems that have power supplies with Power Factors of less than 1.0. Because of this, any use of Watts to represent the power consumed by a product fails to accurately represent the total load the product presents to the power system, either within a building, or on the power grid beyond. Further, watts are an inaccurate measure of load for sizing electrical circuits, breakers or fuses.

The Fallacy of Lumens per WATT – Reality:

The majority of solid-state lighting products are powered by power supplies with Power Factors of between .50 and .90. That means that an SSL product advertised to consume 20 Watts, may actually be consuming anywhere from 22 to 40 VA. This has a significant impact on the actual energy saved, and significantly alters the representations of efficacy that utilize Watts as the measure of power consumption. For example, a 100lm/W lighting product, with a power factor of .50, will actually be delivering only 50 lumens for each VA unit of power produced to support it.

Since raw LED device lumen output is measured with lab power supplies at a fixed voltage and current, the metric represented assumes a PF of 1.0, or unity, so the term Watts and VA are interchanged as universal. However, in actual practice, where the LED is connected to a power supply and driver, this unity condition is lost, as attaining a PF of 1.0 is either very expensive or impossible to attain. For this reason, the use of the term lumens per watt to represent lighting product efficacy is incomplete and inaccurate. One cannot simply measure the Active Power (Watts) presented by the lighting system, and assume that the power factor is 1.0.

For purposes of accuracy the term lumens per watt, should be changed to lumens per VA to reflect the loss of unity presented by powe supplies with Power Factors less than 1.0.

The Arguments:

Arguments of Power Factor are numerous. First, the total Power Factor presented by a building on the electrical power system is the most critical issue to the utilities in scaling power delivery. In this, there are strategies available to correct power factor at the building level, and at the power system level, that are less costly than integrating power factor correction circuits on every individual load on a system. However, this is not as simple as it sounds, and requires the consumption or generation of electricity to accomplish, which does not generate light. Further, regardless of up-stream power generation, internal building circuiting demands accounting of the actual amps load of each load on each circuit, as this is how over-current protection devices are sized, and operate.

So, regardless of whether the missing load is measured, or whether power factor is corrected by the building or utility, low power factor power supplies demand larger circuits within the building, and consume more total power than high power factor systems. Further, low power factor power supplies also generate noise on the AC circuit, which interferes with other systems sharing the same power system, which imparts losses of efficiency and other undesirable effects on data and communications systems.

Saving Energy vs. Saving Money:

When it comes to energy savings – the issue of ROI, and reductions in metered power costs are the key issues discussed. Interestingly, when this is the core driver, a case can be made to cheat the system by purposefully utilizing low PF electronics. For example, for an apparent load of 20VA, a power supply with a PF of 50% will only show an Active Power load of 10W, reducing calculated energy consumption by half.

There are a significant number of retrofit lamps and low cost LED products that produce just such a condition. In tests accomplished at Lumenique, the majority of retrofit lamps tested with power factors of .53 to .81. That means for these products, actual energy demand placed on the building system are 19% to 47% greater than the lamp watts shown on their respective product labels. If applied to the efficacy of these products, the range of 40lm/W to 79 lm/W advertised equates to an actual 27 lm/VA, to 54 lm/VA. Tests of commercial lighting products have produced significantly grater differences, ranging from .36 to .90 PF. In the worst case (.36 PF) the product also exhibited 120Hz modulation of the light source, creating visible flicker on top of poor power utilization.

Recommendations

• Regardless of what metric one uses for ROI calculations to justify product costs, ignore watts when appraising product efficacy. Use input Lumens / Connection Amps x Volts for efficacy comparisons between products to insure that all PF losses are included. This cannot be derived from input watts, as that value does not include PF effect. Ask the manufacturer for connected Amps. If this is the same as Watts/Volts, ask again, as this would indicate a PF of 1.0 (unity) which is impossible to accomplish in electronic power supplies.
• When connecting lighting loads to electrical circuits, use Amps per fixture, not watts, to avoid the potential of over-loading the circuit.
• Demand to know what the PF is of the products being utilized. Low power factors are often a signal of cheap electronic approaches or power supply designs that may have other performance and longevity issues. A PF of between .80 and .90 is achievable at reasonable cost, and should be considered in all commercial lighting use as the minimum range.
• Watch out for generic remote and plug-in power supplies. Many of these operate at low efficiency not represented in the product specifications, and have low power factors, which are made worse by under-loading the power supply below its maximum rated load – where efficiency and PF is measured.
• Ignore arguments that PF is not important, or just a utility company issue. Their is never a good reason to consume energy necessarily in the effort to reduce energy consumption.

ArchLED’11 will be marked as the official coming out for Tasca, my work lighting product offering. We presented examples of the base Uno line, as well as several Renovar and one Accent light. If you are wondering what these are, and are curious to learn more, you can visit the Tasca web site now. The sitre is fully populated with pictures and a specification download at:

Tasca Web Link

We have also put several products up on the Lumenique Product Center for direct purcahse. These are semi-pre-configured products with popular options. You can choose one or dozens, we don’t mind.

Tasca at the Lumenique Product Center

While I do not intend to make this blog a commercial site promoting products and pitching our offerings, I do need to make a living, so there will be occasional updates to share where we are and what we are doing in this regard. This is how we pay for the fun side of being in the business, and afford the time to invest and share with others information on solid-state lighting.

A Little More on Tasca

Tasca is primarily focused on the work environment. Whether this is a machine operation, an assembly work station, an inspection station, or administration workplace, my intent is to offer the most effective light for enhancing visual performance with a durable product. I’ve invested decades experimenting with task lighting. My personal approach has been to lower ambient surrounding light levels to the minimum required to support the low acuity activities in the space, supplemented by localized  task lighting to enhance visual performance in critical work areas. I have applied this in lighting designs over the last 30 years to reduce energy consumption, and live under it on a daily basis. In other words, I am passionate about this approach and believe it is a superior approach to achieve high visual performance. I strongly believe we are over-lighting our work spaces to some compromised light level, which is too high for ambient requirements and too low for effective task performance.

At ArchLED11, held in Chicago November 9-10, TASCA will be revealed publicly for the first time.

TASCA is a lighting professional based product focused on hard service task lighting. This is not the decorative foo-fah, designer pretty stuff that intends first to please the eye with elegant line and sexy physical execution of artistic design that just happens to put out a little light to justify their existence. Tasca focuses first on delivering high quality light on the task and work surface, of a color and level to improve visual performance. Unlike low power light emitting decorations, the smallest Tasca products delivers 210 Fc at a distance of 18″, lighting an area of 36″+ in a smooth light pattern free of harsh shadows. We deliver a unified single light source presence to eliminate the multi-dot dazzle and fun-house shadowing created by the typical multiple LED arrays found in lesser lighting products. Tasca optics control brightness to avoid discomfort glare, while delivering the efficiency, instant on, flicker free, low heat, high quality  light of solid-state technology that no conventional light source can hope to compete with, in a hard service package designed to withstand hard use for decades. Tasca intends to participate in putting an end to the era of inefficient heat of halogen and slow starting flicker and poor intensity of CFL work lighting.

There will be three executions of Tasca presented at the show:

TASCA UNO is the core product line, offering flexible goose-neck arms in a wide range of lengths and mechanical arm mounting, as well as direct mount, magnetic base mount, stand and bracket mounts. Uno offers customization of configurations to suit the exact mounting configuration needed to satisfy application needs. We’ll do customs as small as one-of requests to complete facility systems. Tasca Uno is designed as a modular system of light head, mounting arm and mount, allowing the customer to put the light where they need it with precision, rather than force a standard fits-all solution.

TASCA RENOVAR is industrial recycling at its best. We capture used mounting arms from classic task lights, like those from Swivelier and Dazor; vintage industrial products from South Bend and others that have been used for decades with incandescent, halogen, or fluorescent heads; and cherished favorites brought to us by customers. We renovate the arms, refinish them, and refit them to include the Tasca lighting head. The finished products deliver the best of all worlds. Recycling of components rather than disposal by integration of the latest LED technology, to deliver significantly improved lighting performance. Tasca Renovar will produce more than twice the illuminance at less than 1/3 the energy of any conventional light source.

TASCA ACCENT is a blend of Tasca lighting heads with more decorative finishes and mounting details. These can be founded on recycled components, or they can be completely custom to suit a specific desire. Tasca Accent is for those installations where there is a need for a little more focus on aesthetics is desired, without compromising lighting performance.

Tasca products are made in the USA, built to customer order. We are not a warehouse operation focused on shoving inventories purchased overseas into the market in volume. Our strength is in our ability to build a product that is specifically tailored to the needs of the customer. Tasca products utilize Bridgelux LEDs, and nothing but the highest quality modular electronic components available. The modular construction allows any potential failed component to be replaced independently producing decades of useful service. Tasca products are also rebuildable by returning them to the factory for quick turn around of refitting and renovation. We can even re-purpose products by refitting mounting components should application needs change.

For those in need of application assistance, we are here to serve. We can help in laying out a lighting strategy, application of task as well as general ambient illumination, to the design and  manufacturing of the mounting hardware required to execute a complete high productivity lighted environment. Our foundation is built on lighting design experience first, with a long history of interest in task level illumination. We are passionate about work lighting like none other in the solid-state lighting space.

This is just the tip of the iceberg for Tasca.

We will have 11 fixtures on display at ArchLED, booth #204. I will also be presenting a couple times and assisting with the show MC duties, so will not be hard to find.

Hope to see you there!

A Too Long Break

The time has been spent looking at the market overall, it’s direction, and areas where there are values to be offered. I’ve also had a chance to look at what I was doing, how it was working for me personally, and for my customers. Among all of this has been my own design efforts, some to satisfy my own needs around the office and home, others to experiment, and still more working with customers to solve new an interesting problems. I wish I could share everything that;s been happening, but that’s not possible due to NDAs and all that top secret tech stuff.

What I can share is that I have been working on a product line of my own, as announced a few weeks ago. I will show more of this soon. Unlike all SSL projects being pursued by others, it is not going to start the universe ablaze, nor is it going to rock the market. Tasca is, a nich market product targeted at customers outside the mainstream, where I can pick off a few targets and provide value. This project has included over a year in experimenting between active projects, and the last 3 months in continuous testing. The first of the tooled components arrived last month, and the first full on prototypes are cooking along in durability testing, as I refine some details. More on this soon…

Tasca aside, the break really was not a break at all, just a redirection of energy used last year to build 52 strange little designs…

A Close Call

Anyone who has ever owned and operated their own business can probably relate to this one. A large organization present an attractive opportunity, promising autonomy, a large budget, the freedom to succeed using their money. Add to this the prestige of that executive position, some lucrative incentives, and well… your mind starts to wander. Even the most committed can be drawn off course by such things, especially when facing the continued drag the economy can be at times. That was Zenaro this April. They are a good group of people, with the new crew building up nicely… Yet, no matter how hard I tried to divorce myself from my little universe (Lumenique), I couldn’t bring myself to a full on divorce – closing it outright. I like my little corner of the world, and the folks who come by and let me play with their toys.

At the end of May, I returned to my own efforts here, and picked up where I left off. Zenaro was nice enough to accept this, and have asked that I continue to help, as consultant. This was a close call, that reminded me just how much I value what I’m doing and how, and all that has been built around that. I’m also thankful that all of my customers hung in and waited me out. Those that knew me best knew what I didn’t at the time, offering some interesting “WTF” emails. This path also led me to inventory the assets of what Lumenique had become, and assess its value to me, and what I can bring to others.

A Course Correction

With all of this now part of history, the next step is to get back to the work of moving forward. With a fairly complete model shop capable of machining, plastic modeling, powder coating, metal forming, photometric and electrical testing, not to mention outright short run manufacturing, I can make all sorts of things. Add a few reliable vendors for optics, LEDs, electronics, and hard tooled parts, and short run manufacturing is in the bag. This will be used to support the Tasca effort, as well as serve customers needs for prototypes and test rigs – not to mention help with strategic product marketing.

Architectural SSL magazine also remains an important interest for editorial exploration. The SSL market is still nascent, making it a rich environment for potential large scale transformation within lighting. I am really looking forward to the coming ArchLED’11 event coming in November, our annual bash.

While all of this seems very much as it was before, the most significant course correction is in maturing the approach to SSL in the lighting market. The technology has grown tremendously over the last 5 years, and will continue to integrate itself into the fabric of the market space. Rather than simply advise others that the time is now to get in, it’s time to put my own neck on the line and jump in with both feet and hands.

A Last Word or Two

I will address this in a future entry here, but just wanted to touch on a subject dear to me – that of the role of small players in the lighting market, and how SSL is impacting them. Of all the subjects that have caused me to loose sleep, this is a big one. If there is a place for small entities to exist, and opportunities to succeed, I want to be there. If not, I need to move on and abandon the thought as obsolete. I’ve vacillated on this topic, from feeling there is no hope (leading to considering moving back into a corporate seat), to visions of conquering small hero’s rescuing the market from the blandness of low cost leadership through massive production capacity from exploited labor. In the end, I’ve settled back on the reality that this market has room for us all, large and small. I’ll share more on this another time.

It’s good to be back on track and re-energized!

They asked what I thought about what I was seeing… so I shared. I know, completely out of character for me, but we must all stretch ourselves at times.

This was part of a series of short interviews that Molex was posting during the show. Take a look at the rest HERE. Take a look at the Matt Thomas interview with Illumitex’s new light sources, way cool.

• Product must put LED light sources into service to deliver a value that is superior to other light sources – beyond simple energy savings
• Product must capitalize on low heat, instant on, good optical control, lack of flicker, endurance to shock and vibration
• Product application must be demanding and serve a need where lighting is important to the end use customer
• Product line must deliver value at a reasonable price
• Product line must include capabilities and new lighting effects that cannot be matched with conventional sources
• Product line to be made to order, with significant domestic content
• Product line is to be configurable to suit end use customer needs
• Company focus must be outside the commodity mainstream and large corporate entity immediate interest at the time of initial launch
• Company must be scalable, with controlled investment requirements, utilizing available technologies without over-investment in R&D for all new technology
• Company must be profitable

Another item I have in my care is a GE Model DW-48 light meter, this one a 1940 model. It has a dual purpose. It reads footcandles for general illumination use, and provides F stop data for photographers. This was left to me by my father when he passed, and remains a favorite of my lighting instruments. Interestingly, this meter reads LED light levels just fine. Unlike some of the modern meters I have, this meter remains within a 5%+/- range of true readings. I recently purchased an Amprobe LM-200LED meter for a field device after discovering other meters were giving me odd readings. The Amprobe device is really good for the $100 asking price, and provides reading in line with what I see using a full blown sprectroradiometer. So does the DW-48, reading virtually the same as my Amprobe, and with less variability than my Minolta T10M and Testo meters. I also like the deco styling, metal and glass enclosure. However, its not very useful in low light conditions, as the meter face is not illuminated and black, making it more a curiosity than a functional meter for daily use. Besides, if it gets damaged, it would break my heart, since it is more than a meter to me personally.
As we rush into the future of lighting, I can’t help but smile at the thought that one day we will look back at what we have in our hands today and feel nostalgic at its crudeness and simplicity. We are heading into a bold new future, that will be obsolete at a rate that will embarrass all prior technologies that have swept through this industry. Just look at one of the original K series LEDs mounted on a star board – it’s got nostalgia written all over it! I have bins full of LEDs, drivers, power supplies and circuit boards that are so far out of date (made just 5 years ago BTW) that I can’t see using them on anything, regardless of their expense. I can get more for so much less today.

For the real cynics out there (I be one), I find it truly entertaining when I am exposed to the myopia of techno-philes now in SSL, who actually believe that LEDs are the ultimate end-all to general illumination. The future is not that predictable. We can be certain of but one thing – that there is someone out there today or in the near future, with ideas beyond LEDs as we know them, that will eclipse what we are able to imagine today.

Photo from Philips Press Release

When the electric lamp was introduced at the turn of the century, the first push for product was to create retrofit kits for gas lamps. They ran one wire down the pipe and used the pipe steel as the neutral/ground. The first fittings screwed into the gas lantern where the mantle and burner mounted. This was seen as an important first step. So was the business of creating new electric table and wall lamps that looked like candle holders, oil lamps, and gas lamps from lanterns to shaded products once shielding a glass enclosure for the flame based light source.

In 110 years since, the commercial market has abandoned all of this to use the new technologies, from incandescent to fluorescent and HID, in new product forms enabled by the technology. This is why the commercial market today is reasonably efficient, given the state of the source technologies in use. It is also why most commercial lighting will be all new product designs using SSL in new ways. While it seems retrofit PAR lamps are a good fit, in fact, most lighting upgrades are installing new products, dedicated LED product, from cove lights to display, and recessed down and troffer lighting. Most commercial products today could not exist within the limits of gas lighting, while even more cannot work without fluorescent or HID. Soon, there will be a growing range of SSL product not possible otherwise – as it should be.

On the other hand, pandering to the residential market has produced a condition where the design vocabulary remains founded on retrofitting of gas, oil, and wax light source technologies. Table lamps and sconces today in this segment would look as home in 1889 as they do today. Retrofitting these exposed lamp products with CFL has been a disastrous mix of  bad performance and horrible lighting quality. Retrofit versions of one of the only new designs to strike residential – the ceiling bent glass light – is truly awful when lamped with CFL. <br><br>I am amused and a little bewilderment that we are going to use LEDs to retrofit the electric lamps that are just retrofits of gas and oil lanterns. This causes consumers to make the direct comparison in the exact same fixture, between two technologies of completely different lineage, often resulting in dissatisfaction. Part of the failure of CFLs as retrofits, is they cannot stand up to a direct comparison with the beloved incandescent lamp, in the same product, side-by-side. New products that offer  no direct comparison, allows the new technology to deliver new value, on its own terms. The incandescent lamp is a wonderful light source, if you ignore life, fragility and energy use – which is exactly what the residential market has done for 50 years. LEDs will never produce an exactly equal one-for-one replacement, they will always be compromised as a retrofit, as the retrofit architecture compromises the technology to fit an obsolete form factor. However, there is infinite opportunity in deploying SSL products that beat incandescent lamps for light quality and aesthetics, that make the old burner lamps look like big black phenolic rotary phones.

Consumers replace old products all the time, of value well beyond that of table lamps and a few sconces. From phones and entertainment gear to cars, furniture, and homes (average stay is just 7 years, so there is no truly inseparable connection between the content of any home building), pressing for a replacement of the old lighting junk, only delays adoption. Manufacturers should be focusing on deploying products that entice customers to move from their old obsolete product to new and better energy efficient products. This has been played out in the telecommunications market, entertainment market, electronic game market, computer market, automotive market, etc… It can be put in place here, if that is made the focus. In street lighting, the leading solution selected is all new LED street lights, not retrofit lamps – for good reason – it is the best approach. Same applies to garage lighting, down-lighting, cove linear lighting, display case lighting, and a growing range of new SSL products being installed to replace obsolete incandescent, fluorescent and HID products. Change is not an issue – when it delivers good value. When retrofits are seen as the preferred solution – this indicates a failure of the market to deliver lighting products of greater value than the compromised retrofit solution.

It my own view that the money being offered by the government as a reward for creating a direct replacement lamp should be spent in stead on awarding manufacturers who innovate new and improved high efficiency lighting to replace incandescent products of all types, including delivering new products that satisfy residential aesthetic interests without continuing a third generation legacy of obsolete light sources.

I respect those pursuing quality retrofit lamp offerings, and accept that my views are not yet widely shared. However, that does not mean I agree with the approach, or promote it as a valid or desirable approach, as there is no such thing as universal truth. We should all feel free to pursue this transformational period in any way we feel is the best fit. In the end, what wins will be what sells, which will likely be a broad array of product from retrofits, to all new products that change lighting in some way.

The sooner we take on the task of moving from horses dragging wood wheel carts around dirt roads, and look ahead to putting SSL to work in new ways to deliver exciting new value, the sooner the interest in retrofit lamps will fade – just as the interest in rabbit ears on console televisions, 8 track tapes, pong games, and stand alone PDAs has. This takes a concerted and focused effort, not a short sighted vision using seemingly easy paths.

Think about this: As we discuss this issue, recognizing that the incandescent lamp is obsolete, the availability of retrofit lamps is enabling decorative residential product manufacturers to continue to make, market, and sell all new products with Edison sockets. With no pressure to change, and plenty of excuses not to, when exactly do we make the real transformation from one technology to another? While fitting retrofit lamps into valuable legacy products does make some sense – allowing new products to continue and advance this as a new product approach is ridiculous.

For these reasons, I do not directly support, nor do I support my tax money being spent on subsidizing, the advancement of retrofit lamp deployment as a priority. If it is going to exist, it should do so on its own as a short term patch, with every other effort focused on moving forward, encouraging manufacturers to move away from obsolete platforms, and rewarding innovators for leadings us into the future.

The challenge is not getting consumers at all levels to swap light bulbs in familiar products – the challenge is in creating new value that is irresistible to them, that causes the market to abandon its familiar obsolete products to capture this value for themselves. This will not come from clumsy fix ups and compromised solutions.

If you are interested in getting a copy of the calendar, all you have to do is drop me an email with your mailing address, and I’ll send one to you. It’s cool, it’s free, and it’s all SSL baby!

You can see more images of the calendar interior and a quick email link at Lumenique 52 in 52 Calendar Offer.